London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

The role of financial incentives in health aid programmes in developing countries will be debated at an event being held on World Health Day.

The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine has teamed up with Action for Global Health UK and the University College London – Institute for Global Health for a discussion on the potential benefits and pitfalls of results-based financing.

Kara Hanson, Reader in Health System Economics at LSHTM, will speak at the debate, which will be chaired by Sam McPherson, of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance.

Other panellists include Mead Over, from the Center for Global Development, Wanjiku Kamau, consultant for Norwegian Government on Pay 4 Performance (Tanzania), Dr Peter Hansen, from the GAVI Alliance, Daniel Low-Beer, from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB & Malaria, and James Droop, from the UK Department for International Development.

Organisers are expecting the debate to be lively and thought-provoking, as campaigners call for more evidence of the impact of results-based financing on health systems and the people most in need of improved health care.

It will provide a critical opportunity to explore the benefits and challenges of using results-based financing for building strong health systems and making greater progress towards the health-related Millennium Development Goals.

The event will also allow participants to consider the controversial subject in the context of the wider aid effectiveness agenda in the run-up to the Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in South Korea in November.

Dr Hanson said: “This is an area of growing interest but it has a fairly limited evidence base. “As with all incentive schemes, there is the potential for unintended consequences.

“This event will put a number of viewpoints on the table and allow constructive debate.”

Results-based financing - An open debate on what it means for health and aid effectiveness will be held on April 7, 2011, at 10.00 am in the Leolin Price Lecture Theatre, UCL Institute for Global Health, 30 Guilford Street, London WC1N 1EH.