What does it take to lead one of the world’s foremost philanthropic foundations with a commitment to social justice and equity, while honoring the founder’s directive for a limited-life foundation? These are some of the ideas that Chris Oechsli discusses in this session.

Religious mass gatherings can foster contagious disease transmission in the home countries of pilgrims. Thailand has two major Muslim pilgrims: the Hajj and the Dawah. This study aimed to compare their knowledge (K), attitude (A), and self-reported practice (P), and qualitatively evaluate their perceptions regarding the prevention of respiratory infections. A cross-sectional mixed methods study was conducted. Multistage sampling was conducted in Hajj participants, while convenience sampling was used with the Dawah participants at two gathering ...

This article is part of the Research Topic 'Health Systems Recovery in the Context of COVID-19 and Protracted Conflict'. The third quarter of 2022 saw COVID-19 cases and deaths in Thailand reduced significantly, and high levels of COVID-19 vaccine coverage. COVID-19 was declared an "endemic" disease, and economic activities resumed. This paper reviews pre-pandemic health systems capacity and identifies pandemic response strengths, weaknesses and lessons that guided resilient and equitable health system recovery. Robust health systems and adaptive ...

Cambodia is expected to graduate from least developed country (LDC) status in the near future, at which time it will be required to make patents available for pharmaceutical products and processes to meet its obligations under the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). Given its impending transition from LDC status, there is a need to balance Cambodia's intellectual property (IP) policies and regulations with public health priorities to ensure access to affordable life‐saving medicines. This will be critical ...

Background: Following the introduction of user fees in Cambodia, Health Equity Funds (HEF) were developed to enable poor people access to public health services by paying public health providers on their behalf, including non-medical costs for hospitalised beneficiaries (HEFB). The national scheme covers 3.1 million pre-identified HEFB. Uptake of benefits, however, has been mixed and a substantial proportion of poor people still initiate care at private facilities where they incur considerable out-of-pocket costs. We examine the benefits of ...

Background: Existing research on health equity falls short of identifying a comprehensive set of indicators for measurement across health systems. Health systems in the ASEAN region, in particular, lack a standardised framework to assess health equity. This paper proposes a comprehensive framework to measure health equity in the ASEAN region and highlights current gaps in data availability according to its indicator components. Methods: A comprehensive literature review was undertaken to map out a core set of indicators to evaluate health ...

Background: Optimising mental health literacy (MHL) at the individual and population level can be an effective mental health improvement and prevention tool. However, concepts of MHL are largely based on evidence from high-income countries. Little is known about the manifestation and role of MHL in countries where collectivist health and social cultures are dominant. Aim: This study aimed to examine the MHL of Indonesian children and young people (CYP) with experience of common mental health problems and their parents. Methods: Semi-structured ...