This week RESULTS UK and 47 other Civil Society Organisations endorsed an EU Manifesto on Global Health. Today we share our colleague’s, Fanny Voitzwinkler from Global Health Advocates, blog on the manifesto and what it all means in the run-up to the 2014 European Parliamentary elections:
“Achieving the highest attainable standard of health for all is an integral part of thriving societies, a cornerstone of well performing economies, and a shared principle of European democracies and their partner countries”.
In the run up to the European elections of 22-25 May 2014, global health activists around the European Union joined forces to cast their messages to European political parties while they are busy defining political priorities for the next legislature.
In a little less than nine months, European citizens will choose their representatives in the European Parliament, which will in turn define the political direction of the Union. Indeed, for the first EU elections since the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty, the new European Parliament will also be able to elect the President of the European Commission for the period 2014-2018.
In order to inform European political parties on the importance of improving universal access to timely, affordable, accessible and quality health information and services, Global Health Advocates developed a Global Health Manifesto with inputs and endorsement from 48 civil society organisations working in this field across the European Union.
Together, we believe that investing in global health is a moral and economic 
imperative enshrined in the core values of the European Union and its vision as a global actor. The one-pager manifesto presents our main political messages and cross-cutting recommendations as a guide to the European Parliament and other Institutions’ external action and global health policies:
- Ensure adequate and coherent financing for global health across the EU policy spectrum:
- Allocate 20% of all EU development assistance to health and basic education;
- Invest in research and development for new and improved prevention, diagnostic tools and treatments, currently under-supplied by the market to fight urgent global health threats;
- Explore the potential for innovative development financing mechanisms and use the Financial Transaction Tax as an opportunity to increase budgets for international development assistance;
- Ensure the political dialogue on the future international development agenda prominently features health as a key goal of sustainable development
- Ensure EU political, legal and commercial agreements do not become barriers to access to lifesaving medicines
- Ensure the development of an action oriented and time bound global health strategy to deliver on EU commitments on global health
All together, we will campaign at national and EU level for these recommendations to be taken into account by our future representatives.
The views and opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of RESULTS.