Inputs to the Outcome Document

This brief offers a global overview of health spending and highlights the critical role of health expenditure data in shaping policies to achieve the SDG health targets. It calls on countries and global partners to strengthen health expenditure tracking via health accounts to improve policymaking, enhance transparency, and promote accountability.

This briefing is part of the Financing Policy Brief Series developed by PRI and other members of the Inter-agency Task Force on Financing for Development. The objective of the briefing is to inform the substantive preparations for the Fourth Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4).

This briefing addresses two action areas of the Addis Ababa Action Agenda (the outcome document of FfD3): 1) domestic and international private business and finance; and 2) systemic issues. It is based on PRI’s 2023 policy white paper, Investing for the Economic Transition: The Case for Whole-of-Government Policy Reform

Financing the Pathway Towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC): Improving Health Sector Priority Setting

This brief argues that taxation policies on tobacco, alcohol, and sugary drinks present a timely and effective strategy for advancing sustainable development while improving public health and well-being. Health taxes not only generate government revenue through higher tax rates but also promote healthier behaviors, leading to improved health outcomes and productivity gains that benefit society as a whole. Over the next five years, increases in tobacco, alcohol, and SSB taxes could generate an additional $3.7 trillion USD in government revenues globally—an average of $740 billion USD per year, equivalent to 12% of global health budgets and 0.75% of global Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Financing for Sustainable Progress to Universal Health Coverage