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July 9, 2009

Wedding Bells for GAVI, the World Bank and the Global Fund?

Posted by Ruth Levine in Global Health Tags: GAVI, Global Fund, Health Systems, WHO, World Bank

The global health meeting circuit is abuzz with discussions about whether the World Bank, the GAVI Alliance and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria will be able to forge a partnership to effectively support health system strengthening in low-income countries – and how that might happen through some undefined activity called “joint programming.” Paris in May, Venice in June, Washington in July. . . the conversation goes on and on, presumably with the intention of coming up with a mutually-agreed plan within the next several months.

The impetus to mobilize money and technical expertise to support improved health sector performance is strong. For the past several years a combination of evidence and anecdote has revved up concerns that (a) donor funding for health organized into disease-, population- or intervention-specific pots can cause problems and distortions, such as inefficiencies in information systems and drug supply chains, and poaching of health workers; and (b) ambitious disease-, population- and intervention-specific goals can’t be achieved without robust systems for financing, regulating and delivering public and private health care. Read More…

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June 9, 2009

Chronic Diseases – Posing a Greater Global Risk Than a Fiscal Crisis?

Posted by Rachel Nugent in Chronic Disease, WHO Tags: Global Risk Network, WHO

This is a joint post with Andrea Feigl.

Chronic diseases (heart disease, cancer, chronic respiratory diseases, diabetes, and the like) are the world’s leading cause of death, and greatest contributor to the global burden of disease. To some of us working in the health field, this is not news. To others, it comes as a surprise that chronic diseases kill more people in the developing world than HIV, malaria, and other infectious diseases combined (WHO).

Yet it was a surprise to us when the World Economic Forum described the global threat of chronic diseases to be more imminent and threatening than – yes, indeed – a global fiscal crisis. Read More…

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May 8, 2009

The IMF and the Swine Flu? WHO’s on First!

Posted by Mead Over in IMF, WHO Tags: Swine flu, WHO, World Bank

This is a joint post with David Goldsbrough.

As the possibility of a one trillion dollar supplement in IMF funding comes closer to fruition in the midst of alerts about the possibility of a new pandemic of influenza, some of us at CGD have been asked about the possibility of connections between IMF adjustment programs and health. Some of the questions are a bit loopy, like: Did the IMF cause the current flu epidemic? And even weirder: should the IMF prevent future flu epidemics? Read More…

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February 11, 2009

Oxfam — This Is Not How to Help the Poor

Posted by April Harding in HIV/AIDS & Infectious Diseases, HIV/AIDS and other Infectious Diseases, Uncategorized Tags: AMFm, Malaria, Oxfam, Peter Boone, RBM, TB, WHO, Zhauguo Zhan

April Harding Today I had a flashback to the days when the global health community was divided into two bitterly opposed camps, the pro-public and pro-private. Younger global health professionals may not recall the days when the two camps hurled invective at each other across an unbridgeable chasm that precluded any constructive discussion. It was my anecdote versus yours, underlaid by “my values” (infinitely superior) to yours (highly suspect). The folks at Oxfam, it seems, are feeling nostalgic, and their new report would take us back. The report criticizes the “Blind Optimism” of people and organizations who would work with the private health sector to improve access to health services and mortality reduction in developing countries. It kicks off with the inevitable anecdote of superior performance from a largely public system, in this case Sri Lanka. Undoubtedly old members of the pro-private camp will be tempted to toss back their own stories. But must we slide back to the old unconstructive debates? Must we revert to my anecdote versus yours? The stakes are too high to let this happen.