Abstract
The International Health Policy Program (IHPP) has been using household surveys conducted by
the National Statistical Office (NSO) for more than two decades. These surveys contribute to the advancement
of several health policies. This article presents successful evidence of IHPP using household
statistics survey data to support the process of health policy and health system development. Nine NSO
surveys related to health under 12 health topics include 1) universal health coverage, 2) health financing,
3) the burden of disease, 4) health (in)equity, 5) antimicrobial resistance, 6) smoking and alcohol consumption,
7) food and nutrition, 8) breastfeeding, 9) physical activity and sedentary lifestyle, 10) non-communicable
disease risk factors, 11) health workforce and 12) health of urban refugees and asylum
seekers. Five predominant characteristics of NSO surveys include (a) one-stop data source available for
most health domains, (b) national representativeness due to large and probabilistic sampling techniques,
(c) standard proxies for global and national monitoring systems, (d) ability to track health equity, and (e)
compliance with international benchmarking systems. The future challenge lies on improvement of the
quality of data and ensuring the sustainability of surveys.
