The Distribution of Health Workers

This chapter examines the numbers and densities of health workers in Ghana’s regions and districts. It looks at why health workers choose urban or rural employment, and how these choices link to characteristics of health worker training (the extent to which health worker trainees are exposed to rural practice during training), to differences between rural and urban working conditions, and to systemic and management bottlenecks. As with chapter 2, this analysis of geographical distribution focuses on health workers paid by the public sector only (the large majority), using data from the 2009 payroll record database of the Ghana Health Service (GHS). These health workers include the vast majority of those working in the nonprofit private sector under the umbrella of the Christian Health Association of Ghana (CHAG).