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AfGH launches HEALTH IN CRISIS report

On World Health Day, 7 April, the Brussels partners of Action for Global Health, Plan International, Stop Aids Alliance and the European Public Health Alliance, launched the cross-Europe policy report “Health in Crisis”. The event took place at the 17^th session of the ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly (JPA) in Prague from 4 – 9 April 2009. Hosted by the Czech EU Presidency, the Assembly was opened by the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic, Mr Mirek Topolanek and JPA’s Vice President Glennys Kinnock (MEP) and brought together 77 parliamentarians of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries and 77 members of the European Parliament.

Action for Global Health’s launch event was hosted by Anne van Lancker (MEP), Belgian socialist and Chair of the European Parliamentary Working Group on Reproductive Health, HIV/AIDS and Development  and included presentations by Frazer Goodwin (European Public Health Alliance) and the report’s co-authors Sabine Terlecki (Plan International) and Marielle Hart (Stop AIDS Alliance). Sabine Terlecki opened the panel by introducing “Health Crisis” and Action for Global Health’s involvement in the three high level events that took place last year in Accra, New York and Doha. She stated that “in sub-Saharan Africa alone it is estimated that reduced growth will cost the 390 million people already living in extreme poverty US$18 billion – or in other words a 20% reduction in each person’s income.“

Marielle Hart then addressed the issues relating to aid effectiveness for health, highlighting the four EU priorities “division of labour”, “use of country systems”, predictability of aid, and “mutual accountability for results”. She stated that the EU and its Member States have made some progress with the first three priorities, but that they still have a long way to go in achieving mutual accountability for results. The EU and it Member States must establish a clear results framework, through which they can be held to account for delivery,  to monitor progress towards the health MDGs and in which aid will be measured by the achievement of lasting changes to people’s health status and lives. 

Frazer Goodwin continued by presenting the report’s findings relating to aid financing for health. He began his contribution by reminding participants of the length of time the international community had pledged to provide 0.7% of donor GNI to aid in 1970. He highlighted how the three international events of last year in Accra, New York and Doha were supposed to revitalize the development agenda and build the political will necessary for all in the international community to deliver their commitments. In the build up to these events EU leaders had in-fact re-iterated their commitments during their summit meeting in June in Brussels. The EU Agenda for Action on the MDGs re-affirmed their aid commitments and sets a series of future indicators for what the EU should be delivering for each of the MDGs. Since then however, they have not delivered the amounts of aid to remain on track, and Italy has announced a halving of total ODA. Goodwin then outlined how Health in Crisis called for greater efforts by the donor community to deliver the funding so necessary for the sector. He also outlined the initiatives on innovative sources of finance were to date too small to bridge the financing gap and that new, additional, sustainable sources would be necessary. 

Anne van Lancker concluded the panel presentations, making a very strong case for the EU not to use the economic crisis as an excuse for abandoning its aid commitments and saying that “now is the time to act!” She stated that the crisis is hitting poor countries twice, first of all because their revenues are going down because of lower commodity prices and secondly because donor aid is decreasing. She applauded the G20 commitment of creating a one trillion dollar package from IMF, other IFIs and trade finance, but expressed concern about the IMF conditionalities and its impact on social expenditure, such as health. She also talked about the role of the European Parliament in the new aid architecture and stressed the need for the next Parliament to develop innovative instruments and mechanisms to track the delivery of aid, which would enable the European Parliament to play a much stronger role in monitoring how EU aid is spent, including through budget support, and measuring health outcomes.

She very much welcomed “Health in Crisis” and its recommendations, but also highlighted the importance of focusing less on gaps and more on success stories and concrete examples of what works at the country-level in terms of providing primary health care for all citizens, so that donors can take pragmatic and practical steps in using existing resources for health systems strengthening.

Participants in the audience, ranging from MEPs,  ACP parliamentarians, and representatives from the Global Fund and Northern and Southern NGOs raised a number of interesting questions, including how civil society in the South could be more meaningfully involved, the role of volunteers at the country level, the need for developing alternative advocacy approaches to make donors implement their commitments and the importance of sexual and reproductive health in achieving the health MDGs.

After the event, Plan youth reporters, representing Action for Global Health, filmed Glennys Kinnock, Anne van Lancker and other parliamentarians from the North and the South, interviewing them about “Health in Crisis” and other global health issues. The filmed interviews will be posted on the Action for Global Health website soon.

click here to download the report