• Health information

Health information

This theme paper, published in a special issue of the Bulletin of the World Health Organisation on health management information systems, argues for the importance of health information systems in public health. It considers how well they are performing at present and looks at how they might be improved through initiatives such as the Health Metrics Network. The authors argue that public health decision-making is critically dependent on the timely availability of sound data. But in practice health information systems rarely function systematically; they are complex, fragmented, and unresponsive to needs. The paper claims that international donors are largely responsible for the problem, having prioritised urgent needs for data over building countries’ longer-term health information capacity. The result is that many countries are unable to generate the data needed to monitor progress towards the Millennium Development Goals.

The authors argue that solutions to the problem of poorly functioning health information systems must be comprehensive. Money alone is likely to be insufficient unless accompanied by sustained support to country systems development coupled with greater donor accountability and allocation of responsibilities. The authors conclude that good examples exist of the use of data for evidence-based decision-making leading to better health, and argue that such examples need to be extended and scaled up.

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