It is increasingly becoming important for professionals in the health care field in developing countries to have a firm understanding of health economics in order to appreciate the different roles of the private, not-for-profit and public sectors in health care, use the techniques of economic evaluation and participate in debates about the organisation and financing of health care. This short course is aimed at health service staff who seek to understand how and why economics is applied to health care. This will enable participants to think through some basic health policy issues within an economic framework. The short course provides an in-depth introduction to methods, techniques and use of economic evaluation in health care for those with no, or little, previous training in health economics. The aim of this course is to provide participants with the skills and understanding of the contributions that health economics can bring to resource planning, allocation and evaluation in the health care sector. The application of concepts will be directed toward understanding and interpreting economics of health system Nigeria and Africa generally. The course will use examples from all over the world, with a particular focus on Africa.