Taiwan's health aid: a call for transparency

Taiwan has experienced rapid progress on multiple indices of economic and human development over the past century, resulting in its recognition as one of the 'four Asian tigers' and being among an elite group of 'high-income economies ' [1,2]. Although there are a number of factors explaining this rapid development, the role of WHO and other international assistance cannot be ignored [3,4]. With this rapid development, Taiwan has transformed from aid recipient to donor. Yet today Taiwan's Official Development Assistance (ODA) as a proportion of gross domestic product is believed to be both low in absolute and relative terms [1,4]. ODA includes both bilateral and multilateral aid through grants, low-interest loans, or in-kind assistance. For 2008, the last figures for which we have data, Taiwan ODA amounted to approximately $430 million or 0.11% of gross national income (GNI), far below a United Nations standard of 0.7% [4]. Compared to Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, Taiwan would rank at the bottom on this index, below Greece, Italy, and South Korea, and its value is both low in relative and absolute terms (see Table 1).