Author Description

"Health outcomes constitute one natural starting point for assessment of the consequences of policies affecting health systems. Yet country characteristics also influence health outcomes." Performance on health outcomes is critical for human welfare, and, until now, country decisionmakers and policy analysts have had no systematic way to judge performance. This report provides them with that capacity. This report contains the results for 15 countries at five-year intervals from 1960 to 1990 on six health indicators: under-five mortality rates, total fertility rates, adult mortality rates for males and females, and life expectancy at birth for males and females. In this report, the authors take aspects of health system performance and describe how countries compare with each other and how their own performance has improved or failed to improve over time. The goal of the study is to prepare a reference document that provides measures that can be used to assess the consequences of policy. Part of the Health, Nutrition, and Population Series (HNP).