People's Health Movement calls on WHO to START ACTING AND STOP THE RHETORIC.
Press Release Geneva:
14th May, 2002
People's Health Movement calls on WHO to START ACTING AND STOP THE RHETORIC.
WHO-Industry partnership-Who influences Who?
Geneva: 14th May, 2002: The People’s Health Movement (PHM) welcomes the World Health Organisation (WHO) Director-General’s reiteration of her organisation’s ambition to tackle the ‘diseases of poverty’ in her speech to the 55th World Health Assembly but is deeply disappointed that the rhetoric is not backed by meaningful action on the ground.
Indeed the WHO with its selective approach and public-private initiatives for funding healthcare strategies is going back on its commitment towards taking a comprehensive approach on healthcare issues. There is no evidence at all that such public-private initiatives and excessive dependence on the private industry have had any positive impact on the health situation anywhere. Continuation of this strategy by the WHO will only be a case of triumph of empty hope over bitter experience.
The PHM further warns that while the WHO is flirting with industry in the name of raising resources for healthcare this is being done without proper guidelines or long-term vision and is only likely to result in the world body becoming a tool of profits-before-people machinations of the drug and other multinationals.
An example of the WHO’s unprincipled liaison with private industry is illustrated by its recent endorsement of the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN). This will involve giving assistance to multinationals selling ‘fortified foods’ in lobbying for favourable tariffs and tax rates and speedier regulatory review of new products in developing countries.
Apart from the very questionable health benefits of such `fortified foods’ the WHO’s association with the `Marlboro’ Philip Morris owned Kraft Foods, which is among the leading players in the GAIN consortium raises worrying questions about what criteria the world body uses in such so called public-private initiatives.
That the WHO wants to tackle the problem of malnutrition in poor countries by doing a `deal’ with multinationals, known more for inducing consumers to unhealthy food, only shows up its desperation. The very concept of the GAIN consortium is testimony to the failure of the WHO’s healthcare approach so far.
The WHO’s involvement in the Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria is also another example of the organisation’s selective approach to the worldwide health crisis and is unsustainable in the long-term. The WHO’s piece-meal and one-off attitude towards the numerous health problems besetting poorer countries cannot solve their health problems which need a comprehensive approach to health care and revitalising of values of Health for All.
The PHM also notes with great concern that Director General Brundtland’s listing of the WHO’s various `achievements’ actually hide her organisation’s inability to stand up to other international institutions and corporations that profoundly and negatively affect the health of millions of people around the world. Bodies such as the World Bank and the World Trade Organisation are making decisions that influence health worldwide but the WHO seems to be too coy about using its influence to protect the health sector from the policies of these organisations.
It is true that the WHO’s influence on health policies around the world has been dwindling in recent times but that is only because it has lost credibility by refusing to seriously address any of the structural problems that underline health problems in poor and developing countries.
It is time for radical change.
Dr. Qasem Choudhury - Dr. Ravi Narayan
Co-ordinator, People’s Health Assembly Convenor, PHA- WHA circle
For details, call PHA media team : Mobile: +41 78 876 5437 (Dr. Unnikrishnan PV / Satya
Sivaraman)
