Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research

As an international partnership hosted by the World Health Organization, the Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research (the Alliance) promotes the generation and use of health policy and systems research to strengthen the health systems of LMICs. Throughout all our work, we prioritize and promote systems thinking, which recognizes that the whole of the system is more than its constituent parts. We also recognize the need to engage diverse actors and improve equity – we target our support to ensure better inclusion of and participation by women, those in low- and middle-income countries and other historically underrepresented groups.

The Alliance is expanding its work on climate change. There is a recognition that while national policymakers understand and recognise the challenge of climate change, they do not always know exactly what to do or how to do it. There is a need to support countries to better understand where to start and what to prioritize to ensure health systems and health policies are mitigating and adapting to the ongoing climate crisis. Based on its expertise and to tackle these challenges, the Alliance is committed to:

1. Supporting in-country work through country case studies to develop guidelines and policies based on needs and gaps recognised by countries.
2. The Alliance’s climate change portfolio’s future project aims towards capacity building, which is central and essential to support countries to ensure ownership and the building of institutional capacity.
3. Applying systems lens and systemic approaches to governance and research for climate change and health systems.

The Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research commissioned 6 studies on health policy and systems research for climate change. This project aims to identify what efforts are being taken on national policy-level in responding, and in the mitigation of climate change, to improve resilience of health systems and health policies in the following countries: Bangaldesh, Nepal, Iran, Mozambique, Guyana and Peru.

Supporting the following commitments:

• Develop a health national adaptation plan (HNAP) informed by the health V&A, which forms part of the National Adaptation Plan.
• Set a target date by which to achieve health systems net zero emissions (ideally by 2050).

Country experience: 

Bangladesh, Greater Mekong Subregion, India, Indonesia, Maldives, Vietnam