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Background Health insurance is an essential aspect of healthcare. This is because it enables the insured to acquire timely and essential healthcare services, besides offering financial protection from catastrophic treatment costs. This paper seeks to establish gender differentials and determinants of health insurance coverage in Zambia. Methods The data used in this study was obtained from the 2018 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey. Data were analyzed using STATA 13.0 software and focused on descriptive and Probit regression analyses. Results The study reveals that for women and men, age, wealth category, education, and professional occupation are positively associated with health insurance while being self-employed in the agricultural sector negatively influences health insurance coverage for both sexes. Other variables have gender-specific effects. For instance, being in marital union and having a clerical occupation increases the probability of having health insurance for women while being in the services, skilled, and unskilled manual occupations increases the probability of having health insurance for men. Further, residing in rural areas reduces the probability of having health insurance for men. Conclusion The study concludes that there are differences in factors that influence health insurance between women and men. Hence, this study highlights the need to enhance health insurance coverage by addressing the different factors that influence health insurance coverage among men and women. These factors include enhancing education, job creation, diversifying insurance schemes, and gender consideration in the design of National Health Insurance Scheme.

Background: The importance of health insurance to individual and society at large cannot be overemphasized. It plays a critical role through enabling access to health care services and cushions the individual from catastrophic treatment costs. This study assessed the demographic and socioeconomic determinants of maternal health insurance coverage in Zambia. Methods: The study analysed the data from the 2013-14 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey (ZDHS) using univariate, bivariate, binary logistic regression analyses to examine the relationship between demographic and socioeconomic and maternal health insurance coverage in Zambia. Results: The findings indicate that a very low proportion of the women(3%) have health insurance coverage in Zambia. The study also found that being married, access to media, higher age category, higher education level, being employed have a positive influence on health insurance coverage while province of residence and type of place of residence are negatively associated with health insurance coverage among women in Zambia. Conclusions:The study concludes that health insurance among women in Zambia is associated with marital status, access to media, age, education level, employed status, province of residence and type of place of residence. Given these findings, the study recommends that health insurance providers should tailor their health insurance packages not only to the needs of the employed but the unemployed, the younger age groups, the informal sector and those in the rural areas

Background: Health insurance is an essential aspect of health care. This is because it enables the insured to acquire timely and essential health care services, besides offering financial protection from catastrophic treatment costs. This paper seeks to establish gender differentials and correlates of health insurance subscription in Zambia. Methods: The data used in this study was obtained from the 2018 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey. Data was analyzed using STATA 13.0 software and focused on descriptive and Probit regression analyses. Results: The study finds that for women and men, age, wealth category, education and professional occupation are positively associated with health insurance. While, being self-employed in the agricultural sector, negatively influences health insurance coverage for both sexes. Other variables have gender specific effects. For instance, being in marital union and in a clerical occupation increases the probability of having health insurance for women. While, being in the services, skilled and unskilled manual occupations increase the probability of health insurance for men. Further, residing in rural areas reduces the probability of having health insurance for men. Conclusion: The study concludes that there are differences in factors that influence health insurance between women and men. Hence, this study highlights the need to enhance health insurance coverage by addressing the different factors that influence health insurance coverage among men and women. These factors include, enhancing education, job creation, diversifying insurance schemes and gender consideration in the design of NHIS.

Unmet need for family planning remains a major family planning problem in most countries around the world. It presents serious consequences for the women, their families and society at large. This study was undertaken to establish the factors that affect total unmet needs for family planning and its components in Zambia. This study used the 2013/14 Zambia Demographic Health Survey (ZDHS) dataset focusing on currently married women aged 15 to 49. Data analysis took the form of descriptive, binary logistic and multinomial logistic regressions. The study shows that, although there has been a substantial increase in the use of contraceptives, combined unmet need for family planning has only decreased slightly over time, and currently stand at 21%, made up of 14% limiters and 7% spacers. Various factors were identified as determinants of unmet need for spacing, limiting or total unmet need for family planning. These included age, partner’s level of education, contraceptive side effects, husband opposition to contraceptives and number of living children. To enhance utilization, policy should not be blind to the respective factors that influence combined unmet needs for spacing and limiting.

State capture is one form of corruption that has received very little research interest over the years. This could be attributed to the fact that many societies particularly in the developing world seem to have institutionalized it. State capture is a manifestation of government failure which involves the manipulation of bureaucratic rule and formal procedures by business and political elites through family ties, friendship or social groups so as to influence state policies and laws in their favor. The aim of this paper was threefold: First, to give an elaborate and detailed discussion surrounding the phenomenon of state capture from a public finance perspective; second, to discuss the extent of state capture in Zambia citing instances of state capture and how this negatively impacts on society at large; and third, to examine the effects of state capture on key socioeconomic outcomes and broader governance while making comparisons with other countries. Analysis took the form of extensive review of literature and descriptive analysis focusing on frequencies, trend analysis and simple measures of association. This paper outlines that state capture is a manifestation of government failure and is based on the principles of the predatory government view of the state in which state agents act as utility maximizers. It establishes that state capture is a combination of a weak institutional and governance structure which gives room for rent-seeking, lobbying, election rigging and class formation. Further, the study establishes that in Zambia, although the perception of state capture has reduced slightly, it exists and has an effect on socioeconomic outcomes such as human development and the growth of firms. The paper concludes by stressing the need to put in place strong social and political institutions that will help reverse this dangerous trend. Key words: State capture, corruption, market failure, pareto optimum, rent seeking, lobbying, class formation, logrolling.

The COVID-19 pandemic has slowed down the operations of enterprises of different sizes and types in different ways. The most affected are the SMEs operating in various sectors of the economy. This study sort to investigate the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on the operations of SMEs in the food and accommodation industry and provide policy recommendations to the government on supportive measures for SMEs. We employed an exploratory methodology with a critical review of available literature, including policy documents, research papers, and relevant literature to the sector Data was collected from four provinces using a survey method, and analysis was conducted through descriptive statistics. The findings indicate that most of the SME's monthly revenues have gone down by more than 50 percent and they are facing challenges such as failing to pay workers, restricted number of customers, and high cost of inputs. Besides, 21 percent of the SMEs reported improved adherence to health guidelines as one of the mitigating factors to minimise the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, only 4 percent of the SMEs have accessed financial support from Government but their businesses have remained the same. Based on these findings, policy recommendations have been made to help SMEs survive during the crisis.

Background The importance of postnatal care cannot be overemphasised. Various studies undertaken worldwide have found that PNC is critical for the survival of newborns. However, in Zambia, despite much emphasis by the government and various international Organisations on the need for PNC, coverage continues to be low. This study attempted to assess the demographic and socio-economic factors associated with newborns' receipt of PNC and the timing of first PNC in Zambia. Methods Based on data from the 2013-14 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey (ZDHS), this study used bivariate, stepwise binary and multinomial logistic regression analyses to examine PNC for births at home and at health facilities. Results The results indicate that different factors influence the utilisation of PNC among home births, these include: place of delivery, mothers’ exposure or access to media and having 4+ ANC visits. On the other hand, place of residence and mothers’ access or exposure to media were found to be the determinants of PNC among facility deliveries. The results further indicate that among the home births, mothers’ media exposure or access to media, having secondary or higher education, and having 4+ ANC visits during pregnancy increased the odds of having PNC within 48 hours. Furthermore, attending the first PNC 48 hours after delivery was determined by place of residence, media exposure and 4+ ANC visits. On the other hand, among the facility births, the timing of PNC within 48 hours, was influenced by the perceived size at birth of the newborn. Conclusion The study makes the following recommendations: more attention to be given to rural based women and newborns; encourage delivery at health facilities; more emphasis on the importance of ANC visits; and need to disseminate information through various media on the importance of PNC even in rural communities.

Introduction: Overweight and obesity have become leading causes of non-communicable diseases and millions of deaths worldwide every year are attributed to these conditions. Currently, diseases such as high blood pressure, strokes, type II diabetes, cancer among others, are attributable to overweight and obesity. This study sought to determine demographic and socioeconomic aspects associated with overweight and obesity among women residing in rural and urban areas of Zambia. It further examined the differences in factors that affect the prevalence of overweight and obesity among women residing in urban and those in rural areas of Zambia. Methods: The study analysed the BMI from a total of (6967) urban and (7855) rural women using data from the 2013-14 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey (ZDHS). Both univariate and bivariate analyses were performed to describe the study population. Binary logistic regression analysis was used to examine the effect of demographic and socioeconomic factors on overweight and obesity among women in rural and urban areas of Zambia. Results: overweight and obesity prevalence were (21.2 percent and 10.8 percent) among urban women versus (11.9 percent and 2.9 percent) among rural women. Age, region of residence, educational level and household wealth of women were significant predictors of both overweight and obesity among women regardless of place of residence. Women in urban areas who resided in male headed households, had (4-6 children) and drunk alcohol had higher odds of being overweight, whereas, women in male headed households only and reported having been drinking alcohol were associated with being obese. Literacy was found to be a major contributor of overweight among rural women. Conclusion: Overweight and obesity are markedly higher among urban women than rural women, and that differences on how these occur between these two groups of women have a socioeconomic and demographic dimension. In order to deal with increasing overweight and obesity challenges among women in Zambia, the paper recommends continued sensitizations about dangers of overweight and obesity with emphasis on behaviour changes in feeding or eating practices focussing more on traditional low fat and low calorie foods which in actual sense are cheaper and produce healthier results. Added to this recommendation is the need to change life styles to include routine exercising and increased medical check-ups.