Table 3.

Recommendations to improve efforts to combat non-communicable chronic disease

Knowledge Gaps

• Expand surveillance activities to include the measurement of NCD-related morbidity and mortality

• Improve the monitoring and evaluation of existing and planned NCD programs

• Identify remedial risk factors specific to Bangladesh’s (South Asian) populations

Implementation Gaps

• Encourage more focus on NCD service delivery

• Improve primary care services by integrating secondary prevention of chronic disease, expanding service delivery to non-traditional health spaces and training informal sector health providers

• Increase number of health care workers with expertise in NCDs through expanded training programs Policy Gaps

Policy Gaps

• Update the Essential Services Package (in the public sector) to incorporate NCDs

• Develop insurance mechanisms to protect individuals, particularly the poor, against the costs of emergency care and catastrophic illnesses associated with NCDs

• Increase budgetary allocations to support the primary prevention of NCDs and evaluation of NCD programs

• Bridge the disconnect between NCD disease burden and NCD efforts

• Identify policy instruments to reduce tobacco, dietary, and environmental risk factors for NCDs beyond the health sector