Dr. Reich's research program addresses the political dimensions of public health policy. His current interests include access to medicines and pharmaceutical policy, health system strengthening, and the political economy of policy-making processes.
A major area of Dr. Reich's research examines access to medicines in developing countries. In 2002, he edited a book on public-private partnerships for public health (distributed by Harvard University Press). The volume includes case studies of partnerships involving specific diseases such as trachoma and river blindness, international organizations such as the World Health Organization, multinational pharmaceutical companies, and products such as medicines and vaccines. In an article in Science (2000), he analyzed how public policies can be designed to address the global drug gap, the disparity in access to medicines between rich and poor countries. He recently completed a new book (coauthored with Laura Frost) entitled Access: How Do Good Health Technologies Get to Poor People in Poor Countries? (distributed by Harvard University Press). The book provides an analytical framework for assessing access to health technologies and uses the framework to examine six case studies of different health technologies. The research and book were supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
During 2008 and 2009, Dr. Reich collaborated with Prof. Keizo Takemi of Japan and the Takemi Working Group on Challenges in Global Health to propose policy initiatives to the Japanese government for the G8 Summit held in Toyako, Hokkaido, in July 2008. Their article in the Lancet in March 2008 (with MJ Roberts and WC Hsiao) presented some of the core ideas on health system strengthening that were subsequently adopted by the G8 leaders at the summit. Following the meeting, Reich and Takemi continued work on strategies to strengthen health systems in developing countries, and submitted a report to the government of Japan at the end of 2008, for transmittal to the Italian government, host of the next G8 Summit. An overview paper on the G8 and health system strengthening by Reich and Takemi was accepted for publication in the Lancet in January 2009, along with three policy papers on health financing, health workforce, and health information (for publication on the Lancet webpage). Dr. Reich's collaboration on this project reflects his engagement with health policy issues in Japan extending back nearly four decades. In addition, he has worked on health systems issues with colleagues at Harvard for the past decade, and as a core faculty member for the World Bank Flagship Course on Health Sector Reform and Sustainable Financing. Based on these activities, he coauthored a book on health systems, entitled Getting Health Reform Right: A Guide to Improving Performance and Equity (by M.J. Roberts, W. Hsiao, P. Berman, and M.R. Reich, Oxford, 2004).
Dr. Reich has conducted various studies on the political economy of health policy reform, in both developed and developing countries. He has developed an applied research tool (a Windows-based software program) for analyzing the political dimensions of public policy (with David Cooper). This tool, called PolicyMaker, provides a computer-assisted guide for strategic thinking about policy reform. The software leads the user through a step-by-step analysis of the policy content, positions and power of major players, opportunities and obstacles to policy change, and strategies for change. The method can be used for health policy reform as well as other areas of public policy. A free version of the software is available on the internet (www.polimap.com). Dr. Reich and collaborators have applied the method for analyzing health reform issues in more than ten countries, in collaboration with national governments and international agencies, and the approach has been adopted by the UNFPA as a core competency in policy analysis for their country offices.
For a list of selected publications and downloadable files, click here.
Dr. Reich also serves as Director of the Takemi Program in International Health; for information on this program, click here.