Mozambique’s public spending on health was 2.7 per cent of GDP in 2011, equivalent to US$35 per capita. In the most recent survey, conducted between 1997 and 2010, there were three doctors, and 34 nurses and midwives per 100,000 people. Additionally, in the period 2007-12, 55 per cent of births were attended by qualified health staff and in 2012, 82 per cent of one-year-olds were immunised with one dose of measles. In 2011, 47 per cent of people were using an improved drinking water source and 19 per cent had access to adequate sanitation facilities.
The most recent survey, conducted in the period 2000-11, reports that Mozambique has four pharmaceutical personnel per 100,000 people.
Mozambique’s health services can be divided into four levels. The primary level consists of health posts, mobile services and rural health centres, which carry out basic health services of both a curative and preventative nature. The secondary level consists of rural and general hospitals, only some of which are able to provide surgical services. The tertiary level includes the provincial hospitals that are able to offer diagnostic facilities and specialist services, while the quaternary level includes the three central hospitals in Maputo, Beira and Nampula. With little or no local pharmaceutical manufacturing, pharmaceuticals are a major import. MEDIMOC is the key organisation contracted by the government to import pharmaceuticals for the country’s national health sector.
There is no mental health act or policy in Mozambique and mental health is not covered in other laws. There are 0.4 mental health outpatient facilities and 2.2 beds in psychiatric hospitals per 100,000 people.
