Thirdly, health systems need to be strengthened financially to ensure commodity security and other logistics.
These markets require strong facility inputs, such as skilled health workers, complex clinical protocols to ensure proper use of commodities, robust logistics systems to ensure commodities and equipment remain continuously available at health facilities, and local health budgets.
Lessons about commodities include the value of well-circulated guidance and consistent supervision to ensure that SP is reserved only for pregnant women, thereby ensuring adequate commodities for IPTp and curtailing resistance due to SP misuse.
The first two objectives pursue the efficiency goal, whereas the third pursue fairness – making best effort to ensure relief commodity delivery to all demand points.
That's why at USAID we are also focusing on all parts of our service delivery to ensure that commodities and programs are reaching those in need and that when they get to a rural health clinic in South Sudan or a slum in India, someone there, often a frontline health worker, has been trained to use them correctly.
For those concerned with ensuring access to health commodities, these longer-term visions require a hard look at the supply chain systems of today: How well have they adapted to today's realities?
This includes mandatory milk pasteurization by traders and improved hygienic handling of the commodity during milking, ensuring milking is not done on cow dung.
The implication is that the importance of the private sector should be recognised by policy makers and that private sector should be incorporated in the formal deployment of modern contraceptives for ensuring widespread availability of the commodities.
Commodities include not only correct medicines and medical products but also having systems in place to ensure availability of commodities at the point of service.
Equations (16) and (17) ensure that relief commodities or blood supplies in emergency tents can be transported to affected areas if and only if they have been located.
