The world-wide growth of the field of Health Policy and Systems Research (HPSR), the boundaries of this field and its role in strengthening health systems, and strategies and priorities for building capacity in this field in South Africa are some of the key themes addressed in a recent joint publication of the three South African partners of the Consortium for Health Policy and Systems Analysis in Africa (CHEPSAA).
The publication, a chapter in the hot-off-the-press 2012/2013 South African Health Review (http://www.hst.org.za/sites/default/files/Chapter12_HealthPolicy.pdf), draws on discussions with researchers and health system managers, as well as an assessment of capacity assets and needs conducted by the Health Policy and Systems Programme of the University of Cape Town (UCT), the Centre for Health Policy of the University of the Witwatersrand and the School of Public Health of the University of the Western Cape. Similar assessments of capacity assets and needs were also conducted by CHEPSAA partners in Tanzania, Kenya, Ghana and Nigeria (http://www.hpsa-africa.org/index.php/resources/chepsaa-outputs2).
CHEPSAA, a European Union-funded consortium of African and European universities, is a partnership whose overall purpose is to increase African capacity to produce and use high-quality HPSR. In the context of this overall purpose, it is therefore significant that three of the authors of the chapter - Marsha Orgill, Nonhlanhla Nxumalo and Woldekidan Amde – are up-and-coming researchers and teachers who have also been selected to participate in the Emerging Leaders Programme that CHEPSAA will be implementing over the next two years.
