2023 Annual Report
The fragmentation widely recognised across the digital health sector is partly due to the incentive structure generated by both the legislative and regulatory environment, and the funding and resourcing flows and levels. Most health funding is directed towards health specific programmes and it is difficult to untangle the funding dedicated to the digital transformation of health systems. There is a lack of publicly available information on current available funding, as well as gaps in domestic and external funding for digital health, particularly for low and lower-middle income countries. This lack of information poses a barrier to: mobilising additional resources for digital health; to more effective donor coordination; to better alignment around country priorities and needs; and to ensuring funding prioritises the right areas for equitable, inclusive and sustainable digital health transformation. Our strategy for 2023 focused on continuing to elucidate this funding landscape at global, regional and national levels and to prioritise digital health investment and the need for action on political agendas.
Transform Health’s report, ‘Closing the digital divide: More and better funding for the digital transformation of health’, published in October 2022 continues to be recognised and referenced by partners, including WHO, the Indian Presidency of the G20, in the World Bank’s new Digital-In-Health report, and in the Think20 India 2023 Policy Brief: Critical, Constructive, Conclusive.
Building on the report, we published a series of policy briefs aimed at governments, donors, and the private sector with targeted recommendations to improve digital health investment. We also published a youth brief, together with Young Experts Tech for Health (YET4H) and regional snapshots for Asia, Africa and Latin America. These briefs, together with the Communications & Engagement Toolkit that we developed, are resources to support efforts across partners (to ensure consistent messaging and positions) to advocate for improved digital health investments and to take forward the recommendations of the ‘Closing the digital divide’ report.
A new costing of the digital health funding gap for Africa, launched during Africa HealthTech Summit in 2023
We have also developed, in consultation with partners, a Partner Action Plan, which sets out key areas of work that Transform Health will drive forward. These include strengthening the case for investment, improved tracking and accountability of digital health investment, guidance for improved investment, as well as ongoing advocacy with governments and donors. We are taking this action plan forward with partners through the Investing smarter in digital health transformation working group.
Transform Health was invited by the WHO and the Indian Presidency of the G20 to convene multi-stakeholder consultations around the development of the Global Initiative on Digital Health (GIDH) – and the country resource portal as part of it. We convened two consultations. For the first consultation, we brought together over 80 stakeholders from more than 50 organisations and gathered their input on the scope of GIDH. The results were published in a short report and blog and presented to the G20 Health Working Group. For the second consultation, we engaged about 40 stakeholders to gather their perspectives on the potential uses, audience, scope and functionality of the country resource portal (one of the tools in GIDH). The results were also published in a report and blog and presented to the G20.
Multi-stakeholder consultations to help shape the Global Initiative on Digital Health (#GIDH) launched by WHO and the G20 India Presidency
Throughout 2023 we continued to raise awareness and call for greater political commitment and action for increased and better coordinated investment. At the 76th World Health Assembly (WHA76) in May, we co-hosted an event entitled “An investment in digital health is an investment in UHC”, with the Digital Connected Care Coalition (DCCC), Geneva Digital Health Hub (gdhub), OECD, PATH, UHC2030 and Young Experts: Tech for Health (YET4H), which included speakers from Novartis Foundation, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and WHO. The event sought to urge Member States to prioritise investments and actions needed to drive a more equitable, inclusive and sustainable transformation of health systems that deliver health for all.
During UNGA78, we organised an event on ‘Optimising digital health investment to deliver Universal Health Coverage’, which sparked an engaging discussion with Transform Health, WHO, World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, Patrick J McGovern Foundation and participants on what is needed to improve funding for the digital transformation of health systems.
During the Africa HealthTech Summit in Kigali in October, we launched the Africa policy brief, during a session co-hosted with the Global Fund and the World Bank. The policy brief provides a costing of the digital health funding gap in Africa, estimating an investment need of approximately US$4.1 billion over the next five years to support the digital transformation of health systems in the region, or approximately US$820 million per year on average.
Transform Health’s side-event during #WHA76, “An investment in digital health is an investment in UHC”
In addition to our global advocacy and engagement with partners and donors, Transform Health National coalitions have also been working on this issue and encouraging their national and subnational authorities to dedicate more funding to digital transformation of health systems.
Transform Health Kenya has been working on a report, Bridging the Digital Health Divide in Kenya: A Comprehensive Resource Gap Analysis. The study aims to identify the resources required to achieve the efficient use and adoption of digital health technologies and sets out recommendations to help policy makers and stakeholders to develop strategies to address the identified resource gaps.
Transform Health Kenya has also been actively involved in the development of the Kisumu County Digital Health Transformation Roadmap. The Roadmap is being developed under the leadership of the Kisumu County Department of Medical Services, Public Health and Sanitation, and identifies all the resources necessary for the digital transformation of health in the County.
Kisumu Country Roadmap Workshop
Transform Health Indonesia conducted research into the resource gap for digital transformation at the primary healthcare level. The research is focusing on organisational analysis, resources analysis (financial structure to fund digital health-based services), technology and performance assessment. The report, entitled Gap Analysis of Resources Necessary for the Digital Transformation of Indonesian Community Health Centres, provides recommendations to the National government on the funding needs of the primary healthcare system to achieve full digitalisation.
