Pharmaceutical company Lupin Europe is aiming to bring an existing medicine for a rare muscle disease on the market under a new name and at a much higher price. The Dutch public television programme ‘Kassa’, with more than one million viewers, reported this on November 2nd, showing how this pharmaceutical company uses public research to increase its profit margins. “This is unjustifiable and even condemnable,” says Wemos’ global health advocate Ella Weggen in the programme.
With prices of medicines skyrocketing under the current system of medicine development, the shortcomings of this R&D model are increasingly proving their right. Contributing to the search for possible alternative innovation mechanisms, Wemos, Health Action International and the University of Utrecht brought together representatives of government and academia on the 5th of November, with the event: LICENSING AND PUBLIC GENERATED KNOWLEDGE: SEEKING A SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE BALANCE
Wemos conducted a case study on the application of Dutch Official Development Assistance (ODA) policy instruments for business strengthening in the healthcare context. With our discussion paper “‘Best Public value for public money?’ The case of match-funded multi-hospital infrastructure development in Tanzania”, we share the findings and key points from the in-depth discussions of those findings with civil society and other organisations – in Tanzania and the Netherlands.
In today’s global health landscape, Public Private Partnerships, or PPPs, are continuosly being formed to tackle some of the most pressing challenges of our era, that indeed call for a multi-sectoral approach and sustained collaboration between all actors. Wemos is actively involved in the debate around the role of PPPs in achieving Universal Health Coverage. For example during the World of Health Care ‘congresstival’ that took place in Rotterdam on september 26th, where we co-organized a panel discussion on the role of PPPs in preventing epidemics.
The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFa) is developing a strategy to invest in better future prospects for young people, with a focus on education and work. Young people (15-35 years) in the Sahel, the Horn of Africa and the MENA (Middle East and Northern Africa) regions are the target group. As Wemos, we gave our input on this subject during the consultation round that MoFa ran from half of July until the 30th of August. The final strategy on Youth, Education and Employment is yet to be published.
In our advocacy for more and better financing for health, we find it important that the call for adequately funding Universal Health Coverage (UHC) takes on board the lessons learned on funding for HIV. Therefore, Wemos worked together with STOPAIDS members, allies and partners on this factsheet on UHC and HIV, which was disseminated at the High-Level Meeting on UHC earlier this week.
The issue of creating jobs in a decent and fair way is one of the most pressing global challenges of our era. This is Vice Versa’s – journalism platform on global development – main message of their special jobs report “The World of Work”, published last week. Our director Mariëlle Bemelmans highlights the specific concerns related to this urgent and complex dilemma for the health care sector: “Governments and donors need to realize the importance of investing in healthcare, including the creation of employment opportunities.”
This week Devex – a media platform for the global development community – explores the question whether governments should see health care as an ‘investment’. One of the people who comment on this matter, is our global health advocate Mariska Meurs. She talks about health financing and achieving Universal Health Coverage, from a rights-based approach. “Reorienting the health funding discourse around human rights may also be economically beneficial, as it disentangles health financing from politics.”
Wemos’ four new papers are part of a series about the Global Financing Facility (GFF) at national level and show the GFF process in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda.
With great enthusiasm and pride we welcomed many to our 40th anniversary congress ‘Global Health, everybody’s concern and everybody’s business, in COMM in The Hague last Friday. With various attendees – from our co-founders and partner organisations, to policy makers and students – we discussed 40 years of advocating the right to health worldwide, the current changes in the global health landscape and of course, the challenges ahead. What an inspiring day!
