Macroeconomic Policies and the Health Sector

Abstract

The objective of this chapter is to assess the impact of macroeconomic policies on the health sector in Zimbabwe since 1980. It tries to link the changes in health sector performance to macroeconomic policies. We trace health indicators, beginning with the expansionary budgetary spending policies of the early 1980s, moving through the stagnation of the late 1980s and ending with the contractionary period associated with the structural adjustment policies of the 1990s. The chapter is organized as follows: In Section 2, we provide an overview of the health sector at independence and the changes that have taken place since. This is followed, in section 3, by a review of macroeconomic policies relevant to the health sector. The conceptual framework and empirical evidence on Zimbabwe’s health performance under different sets of macroeconomic policies are presented in Section 4. Since the HIV/AIDS pandemic has been an important intervening factor, making precise causal links between macroeconomic policies and health sector performance difficult to establish, Section 5 addresses how the pandemic has placed additional pressures on the health sector and its implications for health policy. Finally, Section 6 presents the conclusions and outlines some policy lessons for the future.