Elsevier

The Lancet

Volume 369, Issue 9566, 24–30 March 2007, Pages 1039-1046
The Lancet

Series
From data to policy: good practices and cautionary tales

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60463-2Get rights and content

Summary

Sound statistics are a key component of evidence. However, many institutional, political, and practical barriers impede effective use of data to inform policy. In the fourth paper in this Series on health statistics, we look at the relation between health statistics and policymaking at country and global levels. We propose a fourfold framework to help the transition from data to policy. Good practices include: (1) reconciling statistics from different sources; (2) fostering communication and transparency, including reaching out to the media for dissemination; (3) promoting country ownership of data and statistical analyses; and (4) addressing conflicts of interest, including those arising when workers responsible for attainment of health goals are also charged with measurement and monitoring of progress. Further investments are needed not only in primary data collection across a full range of sources but also in building capacity in countries to analyse, interpret, and present statistics effectively in ways that are meaningful and useful for policymaking.

Section snippets

The rocky path from data to policy

Evidence-based policymaking has been defined as a “rigorous approach that gathers, critically appraises and uses high quality research evidence to inform policy making and profession practice”.5 Evidence can take many forms: research, economic, and statistical modelling; cost-benefit analyses; stakeholder opinion; and public perceptions and beliefs. The important feature is use of rigorous techniques to develop and maintain a robust evidence base from which to develop policy options. Sound

Routinely reported service data

Health policymakers turn naturally to the health-care system for information. Routine and administrative reports are generated as a by-product of patient-provider interactions and health-facility functioning. (Routine administrative records also generate data for vital statistics through the civil registration system. However, in most low-income settings, these systems are rarely comprehensive in coverage or of sufficient quality to be used as a basis for generating health statistics.) Health

Smoothing the pathway from information to policy: a fourfold schema

Although important challenges need to be addressed in terms of data availability and quality, resolution of these technical issues alone is unlikely to be sufficient to overcome barriers to evidence-based policymaking. Smoothing the pathway from information to policy needs action on the demand side, including management of tensions arising from different values and conflicting political, technical, and cultural perspectives. We present a fourfold schema of good practices at country and global

Conclusions

As more and more countries embark on health reforms and strategies to reduce poverty, the need for sound statistics to identify difficulties with implementation and to assess outcomes will become increasingly acute. In a complex world, keeping track of the effects of policy decisions requires statistical systems that permit rigorous monitoring and assessment. Very few good examples are available, although valuable lessons have been learnt from experiences in Mexico, which, uniquely, invested in

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