Statement | 23 May, 2018 | Download PDF
Thank you Chair,
GPW13 is an ambitious blueprint for WHO reform, which includes how WHO addresses global health challenges, interacts with other international entities and makes itself accountable to governments and others stakeholders. .
Health Action International has stated on previous occasions, we note positively WHO willingness to improve and promote transparency at all levels of public health policies, programmes and actions. We encourage member states and other concerned parties, such as pharmaceutical companies and research institutions, to heed this call; transparency on issues such as medicine pricing, R&D costs and clinical trial data should be given special consideration.
GPW13 acknowledges a more active role for WHO in the promotion of sustainable and health needs oriented innovation. The status quo of high prices of medicines, linked to a patent-centred model of R&D is untenable for many governments and countless patients worldwide. We therefore call on member States to ask WHO to explore and support the design and development of feasibility studies for alternative innovation models based on delinkage between the cost of R&D and price of the product.
Finally, we welcome the provisional taxonomy of outcomes, in particular the strengthening of health systems as core of the fulfillment of Universal Health Care (UHC) and the reduction of Anti-Microbial Resistance. Fields in which collaboration between civil society, national authorities and international organisations is yielding excellent results.
Thank you.