WHO 
Projects Summary:
The Country Cooperation Strategy (CCS) refl
ects the medium-term vision for technical
cooperation of World Health Organization (W
HO) with a Member State and defines the
strategic framework for working within that
country. It is the key document to guide the
biennial collaborative operati
on plan of WHO with countries
usually over a period of six
years. The CCS brings togeth
er the collective technical st
rength of WHO support at the
country office, Regional Office a
nd headquarters levels in a cohe
rent manner with a view to
address the country’s health
priorities and challenges. The
current document discusses the
priorities for Pakistan for the period 2011–2017 under the unique circumstances of no
Ministry of Health at the nationa
l level. The document critically analyses in great detail the
health situation in th
e country including strengths and w
eaknesses of all six building blocks
of the health system, activities of health de
velopment partners and the exact pattern of
financing in the health se
ctor of Pakistan. Its aim is to faci
litate the provision of health for all
within the purview of the primary health ca
re philosophy and the pursuit of the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs).
Pakistan is a large country with an area of around 800 000 kilometres and an estimated
population of 173.5 million in 2011, making it the
fifth most populous country in the world
and the largest in the WHO Eastern Mediterran
ean Region. The country is divided into five
provinces, Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and the relatively smaller
Gilgit–Baltistan, as well as three territories, Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA),
Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Islama
bad Capital Territory. The country has
experienced several natural a
nd other disasters following th
e massive earthquake of 2005.
Militancy in its northern belt has created se
veral security-compromised areas making access
to health care problematic. A c
onsistently high population growth
rate exceeding 2% annually
has led to Pakistan being quite a young nati
on with over 35% of its
population being under
the age of 14 years. Despite a well-developed and multi-tiered health infrastructure, the
country has poor health indicato
rs such as high maternal, infa
nt and under-5 mortality and a
high burden of communicable diseases
such as tuberculosis and he
patitis B and C, in addition
to a rising trend of nonc
ommunicable diseases.