Thanks for sharing, Tom! Could you say a little more about how you see the “classic” EA global health programs fitting into your paradigm? These programs tend to do one thing—like hand out anti-malarial bednets—and aim at doing that very well. EA funders try to be very careful not to fund things that the government (or a non-EA funder) would have otherwise funded. So that would suggest classic EA interventions are “marginal” rather than “core” in your framework. On the other hand, they have a very high return for each dollar invested, which suggests you might classify them as “core.”
Hi Jason, you’re right that our proposal is that donors would shift away from funding these kinds of programmes directly but that instead they would not only finance services at the margin but also provide technical support to prioritise and then deliver on those local priorities. I guess it’s the health policy version of the “teach a man to fish” principle. Sure, giving bed nets or antiretrovirals does some good, but helping to build an effective health system is better. And I’m not at all convinced that governments wouldn’t fund these high value services instead. I would say it’s more that administrators take whatever help is being offered and then try to run a health system around it, but managing these donations takes work and makes it harder to strengthen the national system.
Thanks for sharing, Tom! Could you say a little more about how you see the “classic” EA global health programs fitting into your paradigm? These programs tend to do one thing—like hand out anti-malarial bednets—and aim at doing that very well. EA funders try to be very careful not to fund things that the government (or a non-EA funder) would have otherwise funded. So that would suggest classic EA interventions are “marginal” rather than “core” in your framework. On the other hand, they have a very high return for each dollar invested, which suggests you might classify them as “core.”
Hi Jason, you’re right that our proposal is that donors would shift away from funding these kinds of programmes directly but that instead they would not only finance services at the margin but also provide technical support to prioritise and then deliver on those local priorities. I guess it’s the health policy version of the “teach a man to fish” principle. Sure, giving bed nets or antiretrovirals does some good, but helping to build an effective health system is better. And I’m not at all convinced that governments wouldn’t fund these high value services instead. I would say it’s more that administrators take whatever help is being offered and then try to run a health system around it, but managing these donations takes work and makes it harder to strengthen the national system.