Notes

to ensure integration with the wider e-health system and avoid duplicative systems.

Recommendations for improving the governance of the PMG include the following: • Create a CabMin committee to act as an oversight committee for the NHSU, and facilitate better interagency coordination by the MoF, the MoH, the

NHSU, and other ministries in setting the strategic directions for the NHSU and reaching consensus on issues such as health financing strategy and PMG budget and tariffs. • As part of Ukraine’s new developments in performance-based oversight of policy implementation by the CabMin, consider piloting a mechanism through which the MoH would facilitate the NHSU’s accountability to the CabMin for relevant aspects of the sector policy implementation, clearly defining responsibilities for agreeing on and reviewing performance objectives. • Develop an NHSU organizational strategy that is aligned with the health financing strategy and with the performance objectives and indicators proposed above by which the NHSU can be held accountable to the CabMin. • Establish a small permanent unit in the MoH with technical expertise in health financing policy, to enable the MoH to better perform its stewardship and governance roles with respect to the NHSU, including its roles on the

CabMin committee overseeing the NHSU. • Further specify the role and procedures of the PCC with respect to NHSU governance in a CabMin order, including the information and reports the

NHSU should provide to the PCC, and formalize a mechanism by which the PCC can share its findings and recommendations with the MoH and the

CabMin committee proposed above.

NOTES

1. Still excluded from the PMG are highly specialized and experimental procedures, which are provided mainly by facilities reporting to Ukraine’s National Academy of Medical

Sciences rather than the MoH and which might be considered “quaternary care.” It is envisaged that all of these advanced services will eventually be absorbed by the PMG, which currently covers up to tertiary care. The legal mandate of the PMG covers tertiary care; it does not delineate quaternary care from tertiary care. 2. The European region in this report refers to the WHO European region. It includes

Albania,Andorra,Armenia,Austria,Azerbaijan,Belarus,Belgium,BosniaandHerzegovina,

Bulgaria,Croatia,Cyprus,theCzechRepublic,Denmark,Estonia,Finland,France,Georgia,

Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic,

Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, the Netherlands,

North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, the Russian Federation, San

Marino, Serbia, the Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan,

Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and Uzbekistan. 3. Out-of-pocket payments greater than 10 percent of total household consumption is the global metric used to monitor catastrophic health spending as part of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3.8 on Universal Health Coverage. Member States in the WHO European Region also monitor catastrophic spending using a “capacity to pay” approach, which is more sensitive to financial hardship among poorer households than the SDG approach. Capacity to pay for healthcareiscountryspecificandmeasuredasahousehold’stotalconsumptionminusastandard amount to cover basic needs, such as food, housing, and utilities. 4. Total debt repayment needs in 2021 alone are projected to be 10 percent of GDP. 5. Subnational budget plans for 2021 were not yet approved at the time of writing, so the consolidated health spending figure was not available.

6. Government spending on health in Ukraine now meets the minimum (12 percent) that

WHO Europe recommends to its Member States. 7. Despite the increase in the number of patients, the number of prescriptions dropped significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic. In November 2020, for example, the number of prescriptions was down by almost a quarter year-on-year, according to data from the

NHSU. 8. Figures were calculated using the NHSU dashboard (for data on number of pharmacies) and the State Statistics Service of Ukraine (for data on population). 9. See https://zakon.rada.gov.ua/laws/show/133-2021-%D0%BF#Text.  10. Ukraine data are for 2019 (MoH Center of Medical Statistics); EU13 data are for 2018 (https://stats.oecd.org/). 11. The value of the top-ups to existing NHSU contracts through the PMG was calculated based on actual personnel numbers. The salary increases were 70 percent for doctors, 50 percent for nurses, and 30 percent for junior medical staff.