Health in Papua New Guinea: a stocktake

Abstract

The economic wellbeing of a nation is in large part reflected by the health of its people. Health care therefore is a community responsibility. This paper provides a stocktake of the current status of the health of the PNG population. The statistics, though questionable on quality, suggest that there has been a general deterioration in the level of health status in the country. One reason for such a trend is the decline in resources allocated on a per capita basis to health?another reason is the low level of productivity of resources devoted to the sector. The challenge, and one taken up as part of ongoing research, is to find ways to raise the productivity of resources devoted to health. Show more