Primary health care was a new approach to health care that came into existence following an international conference in Alma Ata in 1978 organised by the World Health Organisation and the UNICEF. The Alma Ata conference defined primary health care as follows:

"Primary health care is essential health care based on practical, scientifically sound and socially acceptable methods and technology made universally accessible to individuals and families in the community through their full participation and at a cost that the community and the country can afford to maintain at ever stage of their development in the spirit of self-determination"

The approach has also been called as "Health by the people" and "placing people's health in people's hands". Primary health care was accepted by the member countries of WHO as the key to achieving the goal of Health for all.

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