Policy Brief and Working Paper: Conducive Factors to the Development of Health Technology Assessment in Asia

With Universal Health Coverage (UHC) high on the global health agenda, governments of many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) have pledged to increase health investments in the scale-up of essential health services to meet the needs of their people. This has led to the recognition of health technology assessment (HTA) as a necessary tool for setting priorities especially in the UHC context (1). This policy brief was developed based on experiences from seven settings, including China, Chinese Taipei, Indonesia, the Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, and Viet Nam, which represent approximately one-sixth of the world’s population. The policy brief highlights the problems and evidences concerning HTA development in the Asia- Pacific region and makes recommendations that may be potentially applicable to settings in other regions.