Essential Package of Health Services Country Snapshot

Resource Type: Brief
Authors: Jenna Wright
Published: July 2015

Resource Description:

An Essential Package of Health Services (EPHS) can be defined as the package of services that the government is providing or is aspiring to provide to its citizens in an equitable manner.

This country snapshot is one in a series of 24 snapshots looking at the governance dimensions of Essential Packages of Health Services in the Ending Preventable Child and Maternal Death priority countries. The snapshot explores several important dimensions of the EPHS in the country, such as how government policies contribute to the service coverage, population coverage, and financial coverage of the package.

The government of Tanzania first created and published an EPHS in 2000, called the National Health Care Intervention Package or the National Package of Essential Health Interventions. In subsequent years, the 13 areas/programs under the Ministry of Health created area-specific packages that went beyond the more general descriptions under the National Health Care Intervention Package. In the government’s Health Sector Strategic Plan III, the government acknowledged that the comprehensive National Package of Essential Health Interventions could not be fully provided because of funding and other health systems constraints. In this policy document, the government committed to revising and costing an essential health package.

Essential Package of Health Services and Health Benefit Plans Mapping Brief

Resource Type: Brief
Authors: Jeena Mathew
Published: June 2017

Resource Description:

Many governments are scaling up health benefit plans, such as social health insurance, to increase population health coverage. This brief presents findings from a mapping between the services covered under the country’s prominent health benefit plan(s) to the country’s Essential Package of Health Services. The mapping analyzes the extent to which the plan(s) cover essential services.

This brief is for policymakers and program managers seeking to promote universal health coverage. It presents HFG’s findings and observations about the relationship between the services in an EPHS and the services covered in HBPs.