Editorial: Partnerships for Health Equity
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Development. Copyright © 1999 The Society for International Development. SAGE Publications (London, Thousand Oaks, CA and New Delhi), 1011-6370 (199912) 42:4; 3–4; 010910.
Upfront
Editorial Partnership for Health Equity G I O VA N N I B E R L I N G U E R , D O U G L A S B E T T C H E R , N I C K D R A G E R , T I M E V A N S , G O D F R E Y G U N AT I L L E K E , W E N D Y H A R C O U R T, C R A I G M U R P H Y, D E R E K YA C H A N D M E G W I R T H ( S I D – W H O – R F E D I T O R I A L COMMITTEE)
The articles gathered in this last issue of Development for 1999 hopefully point the way to a new millennium of partnership and equity. This special edition is the result of partnership among the World Health Organization, the Society for International Development and the Rockefeller Foundation. These three organizations have come together because of their shared deep concern about the impact of globalization on equity and health. Globalization has ushered in a new epoch in world politics, somewhat conflictingly characterized by rapid economic transformation, new trade regimes and a growing increase in the poverty gap, along with revolutionary electronic communications and the hope held out by the new transnational social and political movements. These trends offer both possibilities and problems for public health. Concerned to discuss these trends in greater detail with a wide range of organizations involved in public health – government, policy makers, civil society groups, industry, community health, medical and research institutions and networks – the three organizations called a meeting to debate the ‘responses to globalization: rethinking equity and health’. Participants were selected from among the associates and networks of the three organizations as well as from a call for articles that was put out on the World Wide Web. This selection process leads to the invitation of a unique set of people coming from different cultures, expertise and knowledge, an age range from mid 20s to late 70s, a balance of gender, South and North representation, activism and research experience, but all holding in common a commitment to greater equity in health. It was in many ways also a new type of meeting, in particular for WHO. As a sign of WHO’s new direction with the leadership of Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, the meeting was held in the WHO Executive Board Room, indicating that
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Development 42(4): Upfront partnerships with NGOs are being taken very seriously. Here participants thrashed out the important concerns for equity and health, beginning with the impact of global forces on the health of local communities and leading to global strategies such as fighting for tobacco control and monitoring of the TRIPS agreements on the health of the poor. The meeting was able to shake the prescribed boxes in which people tend to discuss public health in order to build a strategic and holistic view of global health. As people from different backgrounds and interests listened to others’ views and exper
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