Forty six years of health financing in Fiji (1962 - 2008).

This paper provides an analysis of the Fiji Ministry of Health (MoH) budget for the last 46 years, its share of the national budget and annual percentage of GDP, its revenues, per-capita health expenditure, staff costs, and the performance on key population health indicators and Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Despite annual increases in dollar terms, the proportion of GDP allocated to the national public health system has fallen from 4% to 2.6% over the last 15 years. Consequently the national performance on key health service indicators and MDGs is declining and health staff are migrating. We outline factors to retrieve the public health system in Fiji, such as the need for political commitment to the health of the people, public policy debate on the nature of the health system, the revision of hospital charges, the need to protect the poor by strengthening means testing, and propose compulsory health insurance for the employed.