Tala's blog

The UN committee on economic social cultural rights appears to have no experience, much less any expertise, on issues relating to the right to health, according to my study of all 18 members CVs which are online. Over the last few decades, health activists have made a major impact on turning the right to health into treatment and care for millions in need, and improved the way governments have responded to both pandemics and neglected diseases. Health activists must be involved in UN Rights Committee, and have the possibility of representation through NGO seats on this mechanism. We must advocate strongly for our place at the table.

The multiple blogs below that speak up about Big Pharma having influence inside WHO raise the ethical question that I saw on the survey on Taking the Pulse :
- Do you think all direct / indirect engagement with pharmaceutical companies should be declared openly and publicly?: Yes No Unsure. I clicked YES. Without a doubt.

FYI: Website: http://heapol.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/24/6/407

“……Global health funding has increased in recent years. This has been accompanied by a proliferation in the number of global health actors and initiatives. This paper describes the state of global heath finance, taking into account government and private sources of finance, and raises and discusses a number of policy issues related to global health governance.

Among the findings are that the volume of official development assistance for health is frequently inflated; and that data on private sources of global health finance are inadequate but indicate a large and important role of private actors. The fragmented, complicated, messy and inadequately tracked state of global health finance requires immediate attention. In particular it is necessary to track and monitor global health finance that is channelled by and through private sources, and to critically examine who benefits from the rise in global health spending…..”