Reflections

Rector Ole Petter Ottersen MD, PhDChair The Lancet, University of Oslo Commission

on Global Governance for Health

" ……at present, the social determinants of health have mostly failed to achieve traction in health policy making. There has been a frequent failure to translate ideas into practice.”

Richard Horton

Challenges

• “Human health is the result of complex biological systems influenced by social-economic-political processes in local, national and global levels”.

• “…there is a fundamental mismatch between most issues of global nature and the architecture of governance we currently use.”

• “What are the incentives for actors outside the arena to integrate health considerations into their decision-making processes?”

Quotes from members of the Commission

2nd Meeting in Arusha

We have much to build on!• World Health Assembly (WHO)• Alma Ata declaration• Commission on microeconomics and health• Foreign Policy and Global Health initiative• Joint Action and Learning Initiative on national and global responsibility for

health (JALI)• Chatham House Initiative on Moving towards universal coverage

– WHO and the International System– Commitments to Sustainable Financing: Need for a New Model?

• Rio +20 • Closing the Gap in a generation, Commission on Social determinants of health• UN Commission on life saving commodities for women and children• Commission on Information and Accountability for women’s and children’s

health • People’s Health Assembly

Build on strengths ofthe Commissioners

Increase synergy

Behind every governmentis its people

"[A] man is developing himself when he grows, or earns, enough to provide decent conditions for himself and his family; he is not being developed if someone gives him these things."Julius Kambarage Nyerere, from his book Uhuru na Maendeleo (Freedom and Development), 1973.

Note from Richard Horton to the first meeting of the Commission:• The developing model is changing• Social determinants need to be prioritised • The democratic deficit need to be addressed• Regional, as opposed to global, governance is gaining in

importance• New coalitions are challenging the notion of global

governance• Civil society is now an important global force• The private sector cannot be ignored, but its role is ambiguous• Integration is a new imperative• Accountability can be a catalyst for transformative global

change

Community shared values

A globe without borders

Governance

What do we have to build on?

Improving Global Health one piece at the time