27
Jan

Effective health policy and robust health systems to address demographic challenges require timely, reliable, and relevant health data. This includes not only data on population demographics and population health, disease burdens, and health risks, but also information on health systems and resources, including services, financing, and workforce. Without these essentials, decisions on public health programs, care delivery, and resource allocation can fail to provide the best health protection to the most people at the lowest cost.

In Asia and Southeast Asia, a key challenge persists in the limited capacity within national institutions, especially in lower-resource settings, to effectively collect, share, analyze, and utilize health data to support policy development and health systems performance. The recent decline in global development funding, including the US government's termination of funding for the Demographic and Health Surveys program and limited resources for global health agencies, poses an additional challenge. Regional leadership and collaboration on data for health, leveraging intraregional capacity and external contributions, are highly needed.