Hanoi (VNA) – Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc attended a meeting themed “Science, technology and innovation as a pillar for socio-economic development in Vietnam” in Hanoi on May 15.

The event is jointly organised by the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Australian Embassy in Vietnam and the International Development Innovation Alliance (IDIA).

The meeting saw the participation of representatives from ministries, agencies, localities, research institutes, universities, science and technology and start-up enterprises, outstanding scientists, and more than 50 delegates who are high-level representatives from the IDIA, international organisations and embassies.

To read the full press release, click here.

Photo © Vietnam News Agency

The post VietnamPlus: Prime Minister Attends Science, Technology, Innovation Meeting appeared first on Results for Development.

In Ghana and Vietnam, both of which have health insurance systems, Ms. Nakamura and her team provide evidence-based input on health financing reforms. In the case of Ghana, strengthening data collection and analysis can lead to stronger medical operations and thus better care; while in Vietnam, the work involves higher-level strategic guidance to develop a sequencing for reforms that will define a basic health services package for citizens and overhaul provider payments.

Ms. Nakamura’s other work includes authoring two case studies: one on tax reforms for adding resources for health in Rwanda and the other on resource allocation and domestic resource mobilization for health and education as applied through the lens of political economy.

Before joining R4D in 2015, Ms. Nakamura spent two years at the Medical Practice Evaluation Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, where she conducted research on the cost-effectiveness of national and multi-national strategies for preventing and treating HIV/AIDS. She has also worked at USAID where she supported the Office of HIV/AIDS and the Center for Accelerating Impact and Innovation on an initiative preparing for the introduction of microbicides for HIV prevention. As a graduate student, Ms. Nakamura spent time working with the Aravind Eye Care System in India, where she contributed to the development of a strategic plan to scale-up its primary eye care centers.

Ms. Nakamura holds an MPH in health policy and management from Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health and a BA in biology and society from Cornell University. She speaks English, Japanese and Spanish.

The post Yoriko Nakamura appeared first on Results for Development.

Achieving the Millennium Development Goals for maternal and child health (Goals 4 and 5) still poses a great challenge for several low-income countries. An analysis of the most recent (2001–2006) Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) and an adjacent prior wave (1995–2000) reveals a wide variation in the role of the private sector in health care for women of reproductive ages and children under five in 19 low-income countries in subSaharan Africa and 6 low-income countries in South and Southeast Asia. Health providers or facilities sought by women in nationally representative households for four care tracers—modern contraception, birth delivery, and treatment of child diarrhea and child fever and cough—were grouped hierarchically into three major sources: the informal, formal private, and public sectors.

The private sector provided more than 50 percent of family planning services in 8 of the 19 low-income countries in sub-Saharan Africa and in 2 of the 6 countries in South and Southeast Asia, mostly through formal private providers or facilities. The private sector—especially informal providers—was even more dominant in delivery. However, in Vietnam (2002), the public sector dominated these health markets for women. The informal sector strongly prevailed in family planning in Cameroon (2004) and in delivery care in Ethiopia (2005) and Bangladesh (2004), while in Indonesia (2002) the formal private sector provided the greatest share of both family planning and delivery care. The informal sector was most prevalent for the treatment of child diarrhea and child fever and cough, particularly in Chad (2004) and Mali (2001). In Vietnam, Nepal (2006), and Uganda (2006), the informal sector played a minimal role in the treatment of diarrhea and of fever and cough, while in Mozambique (2003) treatment by the public sector dominated. Treatment of these two diseases by the formal private sector predominated in India (2005).

A comparison of two DHS waves (five to six years apart) shed light on an expanding (or shrinking) trend in this private-public mix in women’s and children’s health care for some countries. For observable urban-rural and rich-poor gaps, the formal private sector typically tended to prevail in the health care for urban or wealthier populations more than for their rural or poorer counterparts. For family planning services, rural or poorer subgroups in most countries relied heavily on the public sector (except in Mozambique and Mali). Ironically, the public sector was found to be more prevalent in the care for the better-off in delivery care in all countries. This analysis of DHS data found mixed results in the urban-rural and rich-poor gaps in the treatment of children. Chad and Mali were the two low-income countries showing a consistent pattern of both the formal private and public sectors figuring more prominently in the care for the better-off, while Vietnam was an example of low-income countries where the worse-off depended largely on the public sector for treatment of both illnesses.

The post Private-Public Mix in Woman and Child Health in Low-Income Countries appeared first on Results for Development.

All four countries have aimed to achieve UHC through social insurance mechanisms. Colombia’s reform started in 1993 and has been able to achieve near universal coverage while reducing out-of-pocket spending and controlling total health costs. Ghana’s reforms are more recent, starting in 2005, yet it has managed to achieve significant gains in health coverage and has also reduced dependence on out-of-pocket spending. Vietnam’s social insurance reforms started in the 1990s. It has increased coverage while modestly reducing reliance on out-of-pocket spending during a period when total health expenditures tripled. Reforms in the Philippines since 1995 show slow progress in expanding coverage, rising expenditures and a growing reliance on out-of-pocket expenditures.

The post Universal Health Coverage Reforms: Patterns of Income, Spending and Coverage in Four Developing Countries appeared first on Results for Development.

I left Vietnam as a refugee when I was 15, so I appreciate the work we’re doing around the world, for all the people who need assistance as I once did.”

Quoc Nguyen is a certified public accountant with more than 20 years of experience overseeing the finances of several global nonprofit organizations and managing periods of significant growth.

As Results for Development’s chief financial officer, Mr. Nguyen manages a team of seven specialists who are building up the organization’s financial support staff and infrastructure after the organization’s rapid growth the past few years.

Before joining R4D, Mr. Nguyen was the chief financial officer for Freedom House, where he managed U.S. and international financial operations, monitored grants to international NGOs and ensured compliance with donor regulations. During Mr. Nguyen’s tenure, Freedom house grew from a $25M organization to a $40M one. He previously served as chief financial officer at Women for Women International, and he began his career at the International Republican Institute, where he started as a staff accountant and rose through the ranks to become the chief financial officer. In various roles, Mr. Nguyen has helped devise or arrange financial structures, policies and procedures as well as train national accountants in more than a dozen countries.

Mr. Nguyen moved from Vietnam to the United States in 1985. He holds a BS in accounting from George Mason University. He is fluent in English and Vietnamese.

The post Quoc Nguyen appeared first on Results for Development.