Financing primary health care in low- and middle-income countries: A research and policy agenda.

In 2022, the Lancet Global Health Commission on Financing Primary Health Care (PHC) set out to generate new insights into how countries could design their health financing arrangements to help shift health systems towards people-centred PHC.1 At US$3 per capita in low-income countries and US$16 per capita in lower-middle income countries, public spending on PHC in low and middle income countries (LMICs) falls far short of any estimate of the spending needed to provide universal access to people-centred PHC. But the Commission also demonstrated that it is not enough just to spend more: governments also need to ensure that those additional resources are allocated equitably, protected as they flow through the system to reach frontline PHC providers, address the problems of fragmented funding which add burdensome reporting requirements and send confusing signals to providers, and that the mechanisms by which providers are paid for PHC should send the right incentives for people-centred care.