Optimizing Primary Healthcare Financing for Universal Health Coverage in Lebanon is a K2P Policy Memo published in October 2025. It analyses Lebanon’s primary healthcare financing system and proposes reforms to improve equity, efficiency and financial sustainability while advancing universal health coverage by 2030.
Key insights:
More than half of Lebanon’s population lacks formal health coverage, while out-of-pocket payments exceeded 85% in 2022.
Primary healthcare receives less than 10% of health spending and remains heavily dependent on donors and NGOs.
The standardized LPSP package could provide broader services at approximately $105,000 less per facility annually than the existing model.
Establishing a fully equipped primary healthcare centre with a laboratory and X-ray facility costs around $284,000.
Lebanon faces an estimated annual primary healthcare financing gap of $242 million under current arrangements.
Switching to cost-effective generic medicines could save approximately $52 million annually.
The report recommends prioritizing primary healthcare in public budgets, expanding the LPSP package, improving procurement and adopting coordinated performance-linked provider payments.
