Cometto and Campbell Human Resources for Health (2016) 14:51

DOI 10.1186/s12960-016-0147-2

EDITORIAL Open Access

Investing in human resources for health:

beyond health outcomes
Giorgio Cometto* and James Campbell

Human resources for health are necessary to the delivery workforce can have a major positive impact on socio-
of health services; only by securing a sufficient, equitably economic development, particularly in the world’s poorest
distributed, adequately supported and well-performing countries, where it can increase equity, reduce poverty
health workforce can any health goals and targets set by due to ill health and ultimately contribute to sustainable
national governments or the international community be development and social justice [4].
met [1]. In spite of the recognition of this central role in These findings reinforce recent related analyses showing
attaining health outcomes, investments in human re- how health sector employment significantly contributes to
sources for health have been and still are constrained by productivity growth in other sectors [5] and that it is more
the perception that the health economy (and the health resilient than other types of employment during financial
workers within it) is a consumptive sector, whose costs downturns [6].
governments should strive to contain, rather than a con- Pálsdóttir et al. examine transformational education
tributor to socio-economic development in its own right. approaches, finding that strategies such as training health
This thematic series sought to examine and broaden the workers within communities, better aligning skills and
evidence on the contribution of investment in human competencies with population and health system needs,
resources for health to broader development outcomes ensuring a gender-balanced workforce and enhancing
in other sectors, including synergies with education, inter-professional learning can maximize the social and
finance, employment, gender empowerment and peace economic return on investment [7].
building. Finally, at a time when political instability and violent
The WHO Global Strategy on Human Resources for conflict affect a growing number of people around the
Health: Workforce 2030, adopted at the World Health world, a new lens to the health workforce discourse en-
Assembly in May 2016, articulates one of its objectives tails examining its potential to contribute to wider state-
around the linkage between investments in the health building efforts. According to Witter and co-authors, the
workforce and “improvements in health outcomes, social development of health cadres and the reintegration of
welfare, employment creation and economic growth”, ar- factional health staff post-conflict can be plausibly linked
guing that the investment in human resources for health to a strengthened public administration, state-building
can deliver a triple return of improved health outcomes, features and reconciliation efforts [8].
global health security and economic growth [2]. But at the same time, it is critical that HRH invest-
And, indeed, evidence from this thematic series under- ments be tailored to the national setting and its fiscal
scores the bi-directional nature of the relationship be- realities; in this context, it is important to understand
tween health workforce investments and the broader the implications of growth in health sector employment
socio-economic development features of countries. On on public sector health spending, and reflect this in in-
the one hand, the capacity of countries to produce health creasing the fiscal space in line with population needs
workers is influenced and determined by socio-economic related to the universal health coverage objectives, as
factors, such as income levels, education attainments, the case study from Serbia by Santric-Milicevic et al.
emigration rates and availability of health infrastruc- illustrates [9].
ture, as Squires et al. point out [3]. On the other hand, The impact of investment can be maximized by improv-
Scheil-Adlung et al. show that investment in the health ing the efficiency of HRH spending: more comprehensive
and reliable data and evidence are required to rationalize
* Correspondence: [email protected] health workforce planning and management, as evidenced
Health Workforce, World Health Organization, Avenue Appia 20, CH-1211 by complementary case studies from Uganda. At the facility
Geneva 27, Switzerland

© 2016 The Author(s). Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
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Cometto and Campbell Human Resources for Health (2016) 14:51 Page 2 of 2

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Acknowledgements
Not applicable.

Funding
This thematic series was funded by Irish Aid through a grant administered
by the WHO.

Availability of data and materials

Not applicable.

Authors’ contributions
GC and JC jointly conceptualized the thematic series that the editorial refers
to. GC developed the first draft of the editorial. JC contributed additional
technical contents to the editorial. All authors read and approved the final
manuscript.

Competing interests
Dr Cometto and Mr Campbell served as guest editors of this thematic series,
which was commissioned by the WHO.

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References
• Inclusion in PubMed and all major indexing services
1. Campbell J, Dussault G, Buchan J, Pozo-Martin F, Guerra Arias M, Leone C,
et al. A universal truth: no health without a workforce. Forum report, third • Maximum visibility for your research
Global Forum on Human Resources for Health, Recife, Brazil. Geneva:
Global Health Workforce Alliance and World Health Organization; 2013. Submit your manuscript at
www.biomedcentral.com/submit