Due date : 27 march 2018 midnight
Task description
Focus on one low or middle income country of your choice and undertake an assessment and critical analysis of its health and development status. Identify key health indicators that provide a good description of the health situation in that country. Also include relevant sustainable development goals from your chosen focus country.
You should structure this assessment task like a report and start by presenting some background to your country (include social, economic and political situation, including relevant historical factors), then clearly presenting the relevant indicators. You then need to discuss the meaning of the indicators and their value (and limitations) within a local and global context.
You should demonstrate your ability to interpret and discuss the health indicators in relation to those that are relevant from the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), but are encouraged to go beyond simply presenting and interpreting these data. Provide an assessment of whether SDG targets are being met and how this compares to other countries in the region and beyond.
You should also consider the country's national health policy, global and other external influences (such as economic and political influences of external donors), and the impact of any international programs such as key Global Funds. Comment on how these factors may have affected the health and development situation. Make an assessment of other key challenges and what priorities might be included in the era of the SDGs.
Please note: You should not structure this assignment solely around the SDGs (e.g. we do not want one section on each SDG) as many of these indicators will not be relevant to your assignment while other non-SDG indicators will be relevant. Also, the most pertinent indicators for your chosen country may be different from other countries depending on what you consider best illustrates the health and development status in the country and its health and development priorities.
In summary, use relevant health and development indicators to provide an overall summary report of health and development in a low or middle income country of your choice.
Key learning outcomes for this assessment include:
• being able to gather and sort relevant data from available sources (such as country-based databases and reports, WHO, UNDP websites and interactive databases such as Mindmapper.org and Gapminder.org, and peer-reviewed journal articles)
• collating data and presenting the most important data clearly, using text, tables and figures; and assessing data quality and noting contradictions
• interpreting data and showing an understanding of contextual influences on health indicators
• backing up all data presented with clear referencing and acknowledgement of sources
• demonstrating ability to move beyond description to critique and analysis
This assessment task addresses the course learning outcomes 1, 2 and 4.