the number of life years saved could be doubled if resources were reallocated to more cost-effective interventions. Demonstrating that it could cost only US$2 to US$4 per life year saved helped make the case that this was something public policy should promote, and many countries responded by promoting ORT, saving millions of lives ( DCP2, chapters 8 and 19). The scientific evidence that ORT can save lives was an important step in identifying this as a neglected opportunity for improving health.
Oral rehydration therapy (ORT) does not diminish the incidence of diarrhea, but dramatically reduces its severity and the associated mortality rate. For example, each year more than a million young children die from dehydration when they become ill with diarrhea. The publication presented cost-effectiveness analysis as an important tool for identifying these neglected opportunities and redirecting resources to better use.Ĭost-effectiveness analysis helps identify neglected opportunities by highlighting interventions that are relatively inexpensive, yet have the potential to reduce the disease burden substantially. It was motivated, in part, by a sense that developing countries were neglecting numerous opportunities for improving health and that better allocation of scarce resources could achieve better health outcomes. The 1993 edition of Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries( Jamison and others 1993) was among the first efforts to guide choices about public health policies in developing countries by systematically combining information about effective interventions with information about their costs.
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