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Major Healthcare Development Challenges
The high population growth rate of 2.3 million people per year combined with slow economic growth and low levels of education has limited the socio-economic development of Ethiopia. Like all other important sectors, the health sector has suffered from the chronic economic problems the country faced for decades. The current Ethiopian healthcare system is severely limited. Ethiopia's health statistics are among the world's poorest, with life expectancy at birth at 47.6 and infant mortality rate at 112 per 1000 live births.
According to the Ethiopian government, childhood, maternal, and communicable diseases are the biggest problems the healthcare system faces. These include, but are not limited to, pre-natal and maternal conditions, acute respiratory infections, malaria, nutritional deficiency, diarrhea, and HIV/AIDS.
Government statistics also point out that diseases affecting children 5 years of age or under, such as diarrhea, acute respiratory infection, measles, and nutritional deficiencies account for 33 percent of total deaths that occure in the country.
Health Services Quality
The quality of health services in Ethiopia suffers from poor infrastructure, lack of critical medical equipments, low number of knowledgeable healthcare human resource, and sporadic pharmaceutical supplies.
The Ethiopian government estimates there are 20,000 healthcare workers in the country, majority of whom work in the public sector. Therefore, the ratio of health workers to population in Ethiopia is substantially less than the average for Sub-Saharan Africa. The shortage of health workers is exacerbated by the fact that a large portion of them, roughly one-third of doctors and one-sixth of nurses, work in Addis Ababa where only about 4 percent of Ethiopians live.
Healthcare Expenditure
More than 50% of the available yearly governmental budget for the health sector (about 230 million Euro) is not spent because of low absorption capacity. The overall annual health expenditure per capita amounts to 4.6 USD, out of which 2.7 USD derive from the public sector including donor contributions, and 1.9 from the private sector. The sum represents one six of the minimum health expenditure (30 USD) suggested by the WHO for Low Income Countries and clearly indicates the need for increasing the percentage of public funds spent in the health sector.
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