Africa: WHO Director-General's Keynote Speech At Health20 Summit - "A New Age of Health Multilateralism, Partnership and Equity" - 1 September 2022

1 September 2022
World Health Organization (Geneva)
press release

Your Excellency Minister Budi, I wish you were with us today, but I fully understand,

Secretary-General Patricia Scotland,

Dame Angela Eagle,

Professor Thabrany,

Philippe Denton,

And I can see my friend Senior Minister Tharman on the screen in front of me; thank you for joining Tharman,

Honorable Ministers, Excellencies, dear colleagues and friends,

All protocols observed.

It is my honor and privilege to welcome you all, in person and virtually, to WHO Headquarters for the annual Health 20 summit.

I would like to begin by thanking my good friend Alan for his continued leadership of the H20 Summit, and for his tireless advocacy for health in the agenda of the G20.

We very much appreciate your work, and assure you of our continued support.

I would also like to recognize the effective leadership of Indonesia, getting clear outcomes like the establishment of the FIF among others, and thank you to Indonesia, starting from President Widodo, Minister Budi, the Finance Minister, Foreign Minister and others for their leadership.

For the last five years, the G20 Health & Development Partnership's H20 summit has brought together global health thought-leaders and stakeholders from around the world and across health and finance, and other sectors.

The H20's support and advocacy for demonstrating the link between the health of populations and economies is helping to influence the narrative in G20 and G7 discussions.

Rather than referring to health as a cost, it is now often seen as an investment.

I am grateful to the H20 for its important role in raising awareness, particularly in finance ministries, that there is a significant return on strategic investments in health, research, and improving access.

As we have all experienced, the COVID-19 pandemic has been far more than a health crisis. It has deepened economic, social and health inequalities in all countries. Already-vulnerable groups suffered the most.

We now face many concurrent challenges. Alan listed them earlier: conflict and humanitarian crises, deepening poverty, rising food and energy prices, drought, famine, climate change, and political division.

The pandemic has made clear that health is central to development.

In the face of these many challenges, we must support countries to move forward on the path to universal health coverage and other health-related targets in the Sustainable Development Goals.

Current progress is a quarter of that required to achieve the SDGs by 2030.

Urgent action is needed to support countries to address these major health challenges and strengthen global health security.

To meet these global challenges, WHO is implementing five strategic shifts in our work to support countries:

First, promoting health by addressing the root causes of disease and creating the conditions for good health and well-being through multisectoral collaboration, for example by enhancing gender equality and addressing air pollution and climate change.

Second, providing health by reorienting health systems towards primary health care as foundation of universal health coverage.

Third, protecting health by strengthening the global architecture for health emergency preparedness and response, including a new legally-binding international accord and a new Financial Intermediary Fund - and as I said earlier, I thank Indonesia for its leadership on the FIF under its G20 Presidency.

Fourth, powering health through science, research, innovation, data, and digital technologies. The future is digital.

Fifth, performing and partnering for health by building a stronger WHO as the leading and directing authority on global health, at the centre of the global health architecture.

I am glad to see that your programme for the next two days includes many of these challenges and provide valuable contributions for policy discussions at the highest level. I'm glad to see that we're aligned on those issues.

Thank you all for your commitment to multilateralism, partnership and equity - and to a healthier, safer, fairer world.

I wish you all fruitful discussions and a very successful meeting.

Thank you so much.

Read the original article on WHO.

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