political Head of a Public Health Department

The assignment is designed to assess your learning over the course of this module. It provides you with an opportunity to demonstrate that you can identify issues facing a health system in a particular national or local context, critically evaluate policy options to address health system issues and explain ways in which health systems may be changed and improved through different policy measures. Brief: Imagine that you are working for a policy taskforce, which has been commissioned by, and is required to report to, the political Head of a Public Health Department/Ministry in a particular health system context – you can choose which health system context you want to focus on. You have been asked to write a 2500 word report which does the following: • Identifies and describes a current issue facing a health system in a particular context • Suggests two possible policy measures that could address the health system issue identified (here, you are asked to be clear about what each policy measure will involve, what particular aspects of the health system each policy measure would strengthen (i.e. the ‘building blocks’, particular relationships, the roles of actors) and also how different actors would be involved in each policy being proposed (i.e. the roles different actors would take on). • Critically evaluate these two possible policy measures in terms of how particular groups, communities or people may or not benefit from, and/or may or not support or resist that strengthening, and • On this basis, select one policy measure to be taken forward and briefly explain why you have made this choice. Format and submission • 2500 (+/- 10%) words – please indicate your word count – this excludes tables, figures and references • This is expected to be an academic piece of work so academic writing and full academic referencing is expected (you can choose your referencing style, but please make sure you are consistent throughout) – please do NOT use large sections of bulleted text. • You are expected to support you make with evidence (academic papers, policies, official reports and data and so on) • Each individual is expected to submit their own unique piece of work • Use an appropriate font and size (e.g. Arial, Times New Roman, Cambria or Calibri, font size 11-12) • The essay is worth 80% of the mark for the course • You must submit via Turnitin which will be set-up in MOLE