Key Findings and Analysis
Below is a summary of the key findings from our investigation. Data collection took place over several months and drew on publicly accessible online information about public health programmes worldwide. As elements of this work will form forthcoming academic publications, only an executive overview is provided here, with full methodological detail including search protocols, inclusion criteria, validation procedures, data handling and ethical approval to be expanded in full as part of the publication process.
1. Regional Outlook: Population to Programme
Across WHO regions, the number of people served by each public health programme varies substantially. The data show a clear gradient of access where more developed or higher-income regions sustain proportionally more programmes per capita. In PAHO (the Americas) and EURO (Europe), each programme serves fewer than one million people (0.8 m and 0.7 m respectively). In contrast, AFRO, EMRO and SEARO regions show far higher figures, between 3 m and 6 m people per programme, while WPRO sits in between at 4 m.
This pattern highlights a strong regional imbalance but also significant intra-regional variation. Within PAHO, for example, the United States and Canada account for the vast majority of regional capacity, while many Caribbean and Latin American countries host few or none. Likewise, in WPRO, Australia dominates provision despite the region encompassing several densely populated nations with minimal or no offerings. A similar picture can be seen in EURO with the United Kingdom.
When those dominant contributors are removed, the regional averages shift dramatically. In PAHO, excluding the United States raises the population-served figure from 0.8 m to 2.7 m people per programme. In EURO, removing the United Kingdom increases the ratio from 0.7 m to 1.9 m, and in WPRO, excluding Australia inflates the figure from 4 m to 10.8 m! These shifts confirm that much of the apparent regional strength arises from one or two countries providing the majority of training capacity in those regions. By contrast AFRO, EMRO and SEARO show uniformly low densities with no single country dominating, evidence of systemic scarcity rather than concentration. Taken together, the data reveal that access to public-health education is both uneven across regions and heavily dependent on a handful of national systems.
2. Global Density of Public Health Programmes (Region & Country Level)
Across the six WHO regions, the distribution of programmes shows a clear gradient with PAHO and EURO maintaining the highest programme densities relative to population size, while AFRO, EMRO, WPRO and, especially, SEARO have much lower levels of provision. As noted above, these regional averages are strongly shaped by a small number of dominant national systems which means that the headline figures do not fully reflect the conditions experienced by most countries in each region.
| WHO region | Programmes | Population (millions)* | Programmes / million |
|---|---|---|---|
| PAHO | 1,257 | 1,010 | 1.245 |
| EURO | 1,034 | 940 | 1.100 |
| AFRO | 441 | 1,340 | 0.329 |
| EMRO | 228 | 730 | 0.312 |
| WPRO | 492 | 1,900 | 0.259 |
| SEARO | 334 | 2,050 | 0.163 |
At the country level, these disparities become even more pronounced. High income and upper middle-income countries tend to maintain much denser networks of programmes, while many lower-income settings support only a small number. Small states such as Iceland and Fiji appear as outliers, with notably high programme density relative to population. By contrast, large and populous countries such as China and India and many states across sub–Saharan Africa show far lower density even where the absolute number of institutions appears substantial.
Public Health Programme density per 1m population
3. Global Distribution of Public Health Programmes by Academic Level
Across the dataset, master’s awards are the predominant route into public health, accounting for roughly two-thirds of all programmes. The Master of Public Health (MPH) remains the most common professional degree, typically practice-oriented and including fieldwork or practicum components. Academic master’s degrees such as the MSc in Public Health and MA in Public Health are also frequent. At the doctoral level, the PhD is the standard award, while DrPH programmes are concentrated primarily in the United States and are rare elsewhere. At the undergraduate level, the Bachelor of Public Health and BSc Public Health are typical titles.
Terminology varies across regions, reflecting local histories and academic traditions. In Latin America, programmes frequently reference collective health (salud colectiva / saúde coletiva). In South and East Asia, terms such as community medicine (सामुदायिक चिकित्सा / Sāmudāyik Chikitsā in Hindi; เวชศาสตร์ชุมชน /Wetchasāt Chumchon in Thai; Kedokteran Komunitas in Bahasa Indonesia) and preventive and social medicine (प्रतिरोधक एवं सामाजिक चिकित्सा / Pratirodhak evam Sāmājik Chikitsā in Hindi; 予防医学 /Yobō Igaku in Japanese; 预防医学 /Yùfáng Yīxué in Chinese) persist, potentially from earlier medically focused education / training traditions. Several European systems continue to use hygiene and preventive medicine (igiene e medicina preventiva). These linguistic similarities (or even parallels) suggest historical and professional linkages with similar terminology emerging across regions that once shared training or colonial ties.
Global Distribution of Public Health Programmes by Academic Level
4. Regional Variation in Academic Offerings
Patterns of academic levels vary markedly across regions. PAHO, EURO, SEARO & WPRO have diverse postgraduate ecosystems with extensive master’s provision and substantial doctoral capacity. By contrast, AFRO and EMRO show more compressed structures with less diversity.
Overall, while master’s programmes remain the dominant postgraduate qualification globally, there are national variations that demonstrate how public health education differs substantially by country context.
| WHO Region | Doctorate | Master | Bachelor | Diploma | Certificate | Other | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PAHO | 185 (15%) | 759 (60%) | 245 (19%) | 18 (1%) | 23 (2%) | 27 (2%) | 1,257 |
| EURO | 216 (21%) | 674 (65%) | 128 (12%) | 2 (0%) | 7 (1%) | 7 (1%) | 1,034 |
| WPRO | 113 (23%) | 277 (56%) | 66 (13%) | 24 (5%) | 8 (2%) | 4 (1%) | 492 |
| AFRO | 57 (13%) | 222 (50%) | 121 (27%) | 40 (9%) | 1 (0%) | 0 (0%) | 441 |
| SEARO | 67 (20%) | 159 (48%) | 81 (24%) | 13 (4%) | 9 (3%) | 5 (1%) | 334 |
| EMRO | 41 (18%) | 129 (57%) | 53 (23%) | 5 (2%) | 0 (0%) | 0 (0%) | 228 |
5. Country Variation in Academic Levels & The Role of Bachelors
Evidently some countries have small overall numbers of programmes, so the findings need to be interpreted with caution. What is clear however is that entry into the public health workforce in many settings is not limited to master level qualifications and, as we know, in some countries it does not require formal public health training at all. These figures suggest that in several systems, bachelor level programmes may be performing the role that master level provision typically fills elsewhere as the primary gateway into the workforce. Master’s degree programmes also act as the main route into doctoral study, so limited master provision often corresponds with very low numbers of doctoral programmes. This pattern has implications for future public health research capacity as well as future academic capacity development.
At the most constrained end of the pipeline, a number of countries offer bachelor-level programmes but have no master’s or doctoral routes at all. Botswana and South Sudan both fall into this category, which indicates a particularly sharp narrowing of educational progression after the undergraduate level.
| Country | Bachelor | Master | Doctorate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Indonesia | 47 | 19 | 1 |
| Kenya | 17 | 6 | 4 |
| Kazakhstan | 14 | 7 | 5 |
| Nepal | 11 | 10 | 2 |
| Zambia | 6 | 5 | 0 |
| Viet Nam | 6 | 5 | 3 |
| Mozambique | 6 | 4 | 1 |
| Zimbabwe | 5 | 2 | 1 |
| Namibia | 4 | 3 | 1 |
| Nicaragua | 4 | 3 | 0 |
| Botswana | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| South Sudan | 3 | 0 | 0 |
6. Global Breakdown by Delivery Format
Globally, on-campus delivery remains the dominant mode of instruction, accounting for nearly 88% of all programmes. Online and hybrid formats together comprise roughly 12%, reflecting a smaller but rapidly expanding share of provision. The median establishment year for online programmes is 2015 and 2016 for hybrid programmes, indicating that most have been introduced within the past decade.
These newer modalities are largely concentrated in high-income countries, especially within PAHO, WPRO and EURO. By contrast, online and hybrid formats remain rare in AFRO, EMRO and SEARO where on-campus learning predominates
Breakdown of global programmes by delivery format
Total programmes: 3,786
- On-campus 3,327 (87.88%)
- Online 341 (9.01%)
- Hybrid 118 (3.12%)
7. Delivery Format by WHO Region
Patterns by region mirror the global picture, with on-campus learning dominant across all WHO regions although to varying degrees. Near universal on-campus delivery ranges from about 97 percent in SEARO and EMRO, with AFRO being around 96 percent. In these regions, online and hybrid formats form only a small share of provision. These latter modalities are most visible in higher-income contexts, such as, PAHO (around18%) and EURO (around 15%).
| WHO Region | On-campus | Online | Hybrid | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PAHO | 1029 (81.9%) | 182 (14.5%) | 46 (3.7%) | 1257 |
| EURO | 875 (84.6%) | 129 (12.5%) | 30 (2.9%) | 1034 |
| WPRO | 455 (92.5%) | 14 (2.8%) | 23 (4.7%) | 492 |
| AFRO | 423 (95.9%) | 9 (2.0%) | 9 (2.0%) | 441 |
| SEARO | 324 (97.0%) | 4 (1.2%) | 6 (1.8%) | 334 |
| EMRO | 221 (96.9%) | 3 (1.3%) | 4 (1.8%) | 228 |
| Total | 3327 | 341 | 118 | 3786 |
8. Global Dominance of Core Digital Programme Providers
Similar to what we had found in Section 1 above, online and hybrid provision is heavily concentrated in a small group of countries. The United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Switzerland and Australia together account for three quarters of all online and hybrid programmes identified. Within their respective regions, these countries dominate provision. For example, the United States and Canada make up about 91 percent of PAHO’s total, and the United Kingdom and Switzerland about 73 percent of EURO’s. In WPRO, Australia represents roughly 64 percent of all online and hybrid offerings.
This concentration highlights how digital educational capacity is clustered within a few well-resourced systems while many countries in the same regions have no online or blended provision at all. The pattern therefore reflects substantially wide digital divides in public health education across the planet.
Top 5 countries by Online & Hybrid programmes
-
United States of America
86.40%
Canada
5.26%
United Kingdom
61.39%
Switzerland
12.03%
Australia
63.33%
Top 5 countries by Online & Hybrid programs - test -desktop
- USA 86.40%
- Canada 5.26%
- United Kingdom 61.39%
- Switzerland 12.03%
- Australia 63.33%
Countries Without Recorded Public Health Programmes
The table below lists the 21 countries identified without recorded public health programmes, arranged from the smallest to the largest population. The pattern suggests that smaller countries are often high or upper middle income while programme absence becomes more common as population size increases and income levels fall. Toward the lower end of the table, the countries are larger and predominantly classified as lower middle or low income. However, this relationship is not absolute. Within the dataset several smaller or lower income countries such as Fiji, Sierra Leone and Rwanda do host established programmes. This raises the question of whether population size, income level or other contextual factors play the stronger role in shaping national provision.
| # | Country | Population (millions) | Income Level |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Vatican City | 0.0008 | High income |
| 2 | Tuvalu | 0.012 | Lower-middle income |
| 3 | San Marino | 0.034 | High income |
| 4 | Monaco | 0.039 | High income |
| 5 | Liechtenstein | 0.040 | High income |
| 6 | Saint Kitts and Nevis | 0.053 | High income |
| 7 | Dominica | 0.073 | Upper-middle income |
| 8 | Saint Lucia | 0.180 | Upper-middle income |
| 9 | São Tomé and Príncipe | 0.220 | Lower-middle income |
| 10 | Vanuatu | 0.314 | Lower-middle income |
| 11 | Luxembourg | 0.650 | High income |
| 12 | Solomon Islands | 0.700 | Lower-middle income |
| 13 | Comoros | 0.900 | Low income |
| 14 | Djibouti | 1.100 | Lower-middle income |
| 15 | Eswatini | 1.200 | Lower-middle income |
| 16 | Equatorial Guinea | 1.700 | Upper-middle income |
| 17 | Guinea-Bissau | 2.000 | Low income |
| 18 | Mauritania | 5.400 | Lower-middle income |
| 19 | Eritrea | 6.000 | Low income |
| 20 | Turkmenistan | 6.000 | Upper-middle income |
| 21 | Guinea | 15.000 | Low income |
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