SOCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY IN THE HEALTH SECTOR

Social Accountability (SA) within the context of the healthcare sector allows for participatory citizen engagement where citizens are recognized as service users who are ultimately impacted by health care decisions and can affect change in health policies, health services, and/or health provider behaviour through their collective influence and action. SA plays an important role in addressing corruption, and increasing trust in public servants and government, which is key to accelerating efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and increasing the power and influence of citizens on agenda-setting.

To assess Ghana’s health sector’s resilience, transparency, and accountability across the thematic areas of health sector governance, civic environment, government, and governance space of the health sector accountability of the country, corruption, and resistance to reforms, the study used a systematic review of documents, using the READ Approach, to elicit the context in which the Ghanaian healthcare system has evolved over the past decade(s), generate questions, and assess the resilience, transparency, and accountability of the health sector.