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Access to medicines and health products
Universal health coverage can only be achieved when there is affordable access to safe, effective and quality medicines and health products.
Countries face a range of obstacles to achieving this, including rising prices for new medicines; shortages and stock outs of essential medicines, especially for noncommunicable diseases, and the growing problem of substandard and falsified medical products entering the global supply chain. Added to this, there are other challenges to ensuring that medicines are not only available, but are used appropriately. Antimicrobial resistance has become a worldwide problem largely due to overuse, and misuse of opioids has led to an addiction epidemic in some countries. Knowing where to tackle the problem is the first step. WHO works with Member States to identify what their priorities are on the road to achieving this universal access.
Areas of work
Regulation and Prequalification
Progress towards enhancing regulatory practices related to medical products around the world is supported by capacity building, promoting regulatory convergence and harmonization.
Universal Health Coverage Day
Annually 12 December
Highlights
School of INN
Medicine price information
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Assessing the progress of Health Technology Assessment use
Overview
In order to better understand the state of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) processes around the world, the WHO HTA team monitors the use of HTA, and it’s related principles, through the administration of a global survey of Member State countries. The survey is also designed to monitor trends in the integration and development of HTA. The survey also serves as a resource to provide contact information for HTA focal points and to provide country profiles, which provide a snapshot of the state of HTA processes in a given setting.
World Health Assembly resolution WHA67.23 mandates the WHO Secretariat to assess:
- HTA methodology
- HTA human resources and institutional capacity
- HTA governance
- links between HTA units and networks with policy authorities
- utilization of HTA results
- interest in impediments to strengthening HTA capacity.
The initial survey was conducted in 2015 after the resolution was approved, with 111 member state responses. In 2020 and 2021, an update to this survey is being conducted with an additional component exploring the linkages with the design and contents of Health Benefit Packages. The survey results are expected to be available in the latter half of 2021.
Publications
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12 February 2026
The selection and use of essential medicines: report of the WHO Expert Committee on Selection and Use...
The 25th meeting of the WHO Expert Committee on Selection and Use of Essential Medicines was held in Geneva, Switzerland, from 5 to 9 May 2025. The Committee...
11 February 2026
Blended learning platform for primary health care and community level workers: user guide to Learning...
Learning on TAP (TAP for short) is a blended learning resource developed by WHO and is part of the WHO Academy: https://whoacademy.org/TAP/. TAP is an...
Whether or not xenotransplantation should be done is beyond the scope of this paper. Therefore, this paper does not examine the important ethical issues...
This comprehensive document deals with the relevant WTO agreements and the way they may influence health and health policies. In undertaking this joint...