Toolkit Released on Incorporating HSS in Round 10 Proposals

Author:

David Garmaise

Article Type:

Article Number: 6

ABSTRACT The Health Systems Strengthening toolkit contains information on how countries can use funding from the Global Fund to support HSS activities, and on technical support providers that are available to assist applicants in developing proposals that address HSS.

A new toolkit for use in preparing Round 10 proposals contains information on how countries can use funding from the Global Fund to support health systems strengthening (HSS) activities. It also contains information on technical support providers that are available to assist applicants in developing proposals that address HSS.

The “Toolkit for Using Round 10 of the Global Fund for Health Systems Strengthening” was produced by Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) and the Health Workforce Advocacy Initiative, in collaboration with Health Systems 20/20. The toolkit includes background information on health systems and on community systems strengthening, summaries of several of the most significant examples of HSS in Round 9, and an updated version of PHR’s own guide on using the Global Fund to support HSS. The toolkit also contains materials to assist countries in (a) developing rigorous, human rights-based strategies to address health workforce and health systems challenges, and (b) building human resource management capacity.

Eric Williams, of PHR, told GFO that in previous Global Fund rounds, applicants have used the Global Fund to support many cross-cutting health system needs, such as increasing the number of nursing tutors and expanding health training institutions, paying for health worker salaries and incentives, creating safer working conditions for health workers, rehabilitating health facilities, improving health information systems, and training district management teams in developing comprehensive district health plans. Williams said that countries can use, and have used, the Global Fund to cover funding gaps in existing health workforce plans and other aspects of their national health strategies. – Williams added that “Round 10 provides an opening for even more countries to take advantage of this opportunity to support HSS, thus contributing to improved outcomes for the Global Fund’s three priority diseases and to the population’s health overall, including maternal and child health.”

The “Toolkit for Using Round 10 of the Global Fund for Health Systems Strengthening” is available at: http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/right-to-health/globalfund-round10.html.