This website broadly documents and covers aspects of in- and outputs of Danida’s Health Sector Programme Support experience in Tanzania. By browsing the pages the reader will not only get an overview of the activities, but can also participate in the advancement of the programme by submitting reactions by e-mail.

The health sector in Tanzania is experiencing a period of radical changes in the way it has operated since independence. Not only affect the reforms the way health services are delivered, other concurrent changes in the public sector, like the Local Government & Civil Service Reforms, are having a similar if not more profound effect.

From the start Danida has been a partner to this process of change. It has shifted its focus from being project oriented to sector support, i.e. support based on in partnership developed sector wide strategies and plans instead of acting upon isolated/vertical priorities. The sector concept has taken root among an increasing number of development partners, resulting in a SWAp (Sector Wide Approach).

As in many other Sub Saharan countries, the health situation in Tanzania is under severe pressure. Public services are grossly underfinanced; disease patterns are shifting causing serious impact on the economic fabric of society and thus on the patterns of private financing of health services, and medical and social sciences are developing at a fast rate.

Technology has enabled fast dissemination of research and thus access to "evidence based" practices. To ensure high professional standards continuous education and the ability to access information is imperative.

In this fluent situation it is often difficult to oversee the impact of certain (changes in) national policies and strategies to their full extent.

The determination to involve clients in the management of services potentially opens a rich source of ideas for the improvement of the quality and practical delivery of services. In this spirit the government of Tanzania and Denmark decided in their bilateral agreement for the health sector to incorporate the element of ‘evidence based’ in intervention formulation.

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