Carla AbouZahr, Rasika Rampatige, Alan Lopez, Don deSavigny
Comprehensive guidelines and tools to help countries rapidly improve their vital statistics systems, based on international best practice are now available. For many countries, however, attainment of timely, accurate statistics on births and deaths and causes of death will require years of strategic and prioritized investment, with technical assistance from WHO, the United Nations, and academia. In the meantime, however, countries will need accurate and unbiased data in order to measure progress with their health programs and broader development goals, such as the MDGs and the growing crisis of non-communicable diseases...
April 2012: Pacific Health Dialog