Foreign Aid Amounts to Just 1.6 Pct of India's Total Health Spend

These facts were revealed in the study labeled, ‘Financing Global Health 2012: The End of the Golden Age?’ conducted by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), University of Washington. Between 1990 and 2010 this is the fourth annual report by IHME on global health expenditure.

DAH activities include both financial and in-kind assistance aimed at improving health in low and middle-income countries. The bilateral development agencies that include the financial DAH include the World Bank (IDA and IBRD), African Development Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB), Global Fund to Fight AIDS, International Inter-American Development Bank, the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI), Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM).

Among most countries receiving DAH, it is less than 10 percent of the total amount spent by governments over health. This is a fact across most of South American, Asia and North Africa. In 2010, the Governments in East Asia, particularly China spent the most on health, at $159.6 billion.

South Asia, which estimates to one-fifth of the world's population, has recorded the least amount spent by the government on health, a meager $22 billion. Foreign aid for health accounts to over 10 percent of public health expenditure after barring Sri Lanka and India, in all other South Asian countries. The global health funds or a total DAH for Bangladesh and Pakistan is $251 million and $261 million respectively.

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