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.

Zambia defined a “Basic Health Care Package,” but this package currently appears to be a list of national health priorities, not services. The Basic Health Care Package does not appear to meet our definition of Zambia’s EPHS. Additionally, according to the Sixth National Development Plan 2011–2015, the government was supposed to finalize and adopt the Basic Health Care Package by 2015, but we could not identify a revised BHCP as of February 2015 (nor does this BHCP appear to be synonymous with an EPHS). The Joint Annual Review of the Health Sector, Zambia (2012) stated that although the ruling party’s manifesto included “defining and providing people with access to basic services through the definition of an Essential Package of Health Services,” the 2012 National Health Policy did not include this activity.