The Health Sector Strategy (HSS) aims to transform our health system to be resilient to health threats, and to accelerate progress made to date to improve health outcomes for the people of Vanuatu. Our approach embraces opportunities for innovation and explores different paths to protecting and improving everyone’s health and well-being.
Being resilient also means being able to continue to deliver essential health services during times of crisis, and to protect our long-term investments in health system improvements. In the past, health ‘shocks’ have often led to human and material resources being redirected from essential functions to emergency response. The HSS commits to establishment of comprehensive, resourced plans for disaster and system responses that will ensure continuity of essential functions. It also builds and expands on advances in clinical services, with expanding specialty care and greater provincial reach.
The future will bring additional burdens on the health sector. Beyond emerging health threats, our sector will respond to rising Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs), a growing need for mental health services, ongoing challenges associated with communicable diseases and unfinished commitments for improved Family Health. The HSS has been developed to equip the sector to rise to these challenges and ensure that all people of Vanuatu benefit from these responsive actions.
We will build on the opportunity of strengthening provincial health teams. We will continue eff orts towards
decentralisation and focus on Primary Health Care (PHC) to achieve Universal Health Coverage (UHC). We will ensure more equitable distribution of PHC services to be closer to where people live, while also developing secondary and tertiary services to support PHC teams. Strong leadership in both corporate and clinical governance are at the centre of our approach.
Read Vanuatu’s Health Sector Strategy and Strategic Plan 2021-2030 here.