PHA-Exchange> PHM meeting in Geneva

[Aviva]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Nance    
  
   Friday's meeting went well; a rather large crowd attended the PHM briefing and Drs Brundtlant and Nabarro attended... 
The press says Dr Brundtland is making a special effort to woo countries of the South to get reelected... 
Zafrulla spoke right after Dr Brundtland; he said that : "I had a dream, with all the PPPI -Private Public Partnership Initiatives- THE WHO BECAME PRIVATIZED!". 
Needless too say this provoked laughter throughout the room... 
Drs Brundtland and Nabarro did not like it much.

Ravi gave a very good briefing on the PHA Movement, and afterwards the PHM reps for the three regions gave a brief presentation. 
Afterward, the Philipine moderator tried to smoothen the comments saying that everyone was in agreement on poverty..., etc. 
He took several questions since Dr Brundtland left and Dr Nabarro did not seem to have decided what to say. 
Among others, David Sanders asked from the floor a question on Gavi: the fact that 90% of the funds went to research and only 10% to implementation of immunisation, while over the past ten years immunisations have decreased (Save the Children report). 

THe moderator took two other questions and then asked Dr Nabarro to answer. 

Nabarro said something to the effect that he would be very happy to "take all the money that went into Gavi and into the Global Fund on AIDS, TB,Mal. and give it to public health.." 

Dr Nabarro avoided the indictment on the privatization of WHO issue, and the turn away from Alma Ata as brought up by other speakers of the PHM. Somehow the question on Gavi gave him a way out. 
  

On the NGO Forum meeting: 

The NGO forum organized by Eric Ram was a big success with several hundred people in attendance. 
There were a lot of speakers, Ravi was absolutely excellent, and so was Judith Richter (on the public-private partnership. 
I (Nance) gave a probably too militant speech on IMF and AIDS, using the book that just came out by Nobel prize and former chief economist at the World Bank, Joseph Stiglitz : "La grande désillusion"- La mondialisation, ça ne marche pas". 
The book says that we are in a situation as serious as that in the 20s, the financial system has gone mad and is destroying the economy, and the IMF is destroying the national economies and world economies on behalf of speculators! 
The IMF steals from the pocket of the State to give to the private sector in a mad binge of speculative orgy.. 
You all should read that book.. 
So I started with the fact that we are like in the 20s, with a financial system sucking away at the real economy, very close to a blowout, another Great Depression, and we all know what happened then: fascism... 
Then I developed the problem with the neo-liberal social marketing campaign that passes off as AIDS strategy, and underlined the urgency of going back to basic public health. 
I outlined how the World Bank was positioning itself - so does the Macroeconomic commission of J. Sachs- to provide "health for the destitute", ie pro-poor safety nets BECAUSE of the ongoing implementation and negotiation on GATS which call for all out privatization of health care even in poor countries... 
I also noted that IMF HIPC and World Bank PRSPs, so called debt reducing pro-poor strategy, today implement WATER PRIVATISATION and cost recovery schemes even in very poor countries like Senegal... 

I was happy to find that all the PHM people agreed totally on the need for public health. A erson from Tanzania said that WHO strategy was going away from primary health care and proposing to "put all of Africa under a mosquito bed net"... 
  

Of course, Stiglitz does a whitewash of the world Bank, but his indictment of the IMF is quite remarkable. 

THE PHM internal meeting: 
All day meeting on Thursday. 
Qualities and problems: 
1_ spending all day among ourselves is preventing us from being among the delegates and listening to the GA, where a lot of interesting things are going on, in my view. I usually spend the time lobbying for "people's issue" among delegates and spotting those who are ready to do something in countries. I hardly did any of that this year as I went to all NGO-WHA actions instead. 
2_ Much time was spent going through what every branch of PHM, and country is doing at great length. It took basically from 9.30 to 1 PM... I think it would be more important for people to give short briefing on WHAT IS GOING ON IN THEIR PART OF THE WORLD. 
Afternoon on action. Discussion on action was very interesting, but lacked emphasis on "outside world" in my view. 
Among the decisions : 
Resolution on Palestine, participation in Porto Alegre next winter, and planning for Alma Ata commemoration at the time of the next WHA. Debate as to whether in Geneva or a developing country like India. Buko Pharma rep (head of PHM for Europe) would like India, Eric Ram would like mass meeting in Geneva. 
Eric made a masterly intervention warning against getting coopted by WHO... 
Ravi told us about the proposal of the Global Forum on Health Research to participate into Forum 6, their next one in Tanzania if I remember correctly. The head of the GFHR is Richard Feachem (now head of the global fund as well). 

Dr Feachem was the architect of the World Bank investment in health and in recent months a public advocate of WTO : "Globalisation is good for you" he said and wrote.."All health professionals should rally to support WTO" His slant is that Market is good for you, the only problem is "corrupt governments"...(editorial in BMJ) 
His personal views are antagonistic to PHM, and needless to say the Global Forum's second in command, Harvey Bale (head of the Pharma industry group) may not share the PHM's views on TRIPS either... 

4_ after the PHM public technical breifing with Dr Bruntland, (the next day) the PHM discussion resumed, as a continuation of the previous day. 

Among the decisions: 

A- As agreed on Thursday, there will be contact established with a view of participating in Porto Alegre 2003. (see press release of PHM) David Sanders volunteered to be the contact person. 

B- The communication cluster circle will be managed by the webmaster, with Unni on media, if I understand correctly, and Mike Rawson will help the secretariat with publications. 

C- David Sanders had put himself as the contact man organizing the participation in the GFHR. 

D- The proposal to have an analysis group, suggested the day before, was put up again, and once more David Sanders said he would organize it and be the contact man for it. 

E- The idea of organizing the celebration of Alma Ata 25th anniversary next year was put up again, (debate on Thursday was between having a big celebration in India- suggested by Buko Pharma- and a big celebration at the time of the next World Health Assembly next May in Geneva - proposed by Eric Ram-) David Sanders said he had a report analysing the evolution since Alma Ata and therefore suggested he be the contact person to organize that too. 

F- Dorothy will be the contact person for poverty and AIDS.

G- Ravi proposed that the WHO-PHM group continue, and it was agreed 

H- Ravi thanked the seven member Geneva group for the work done and proposed consolidation of the structure.I'll be part of that of course, with Alison, Inez, Foshia, Eric, (I've forgotten who the others are). Foshia Rasheed, now at UNAIDS, made a lengthy speech in defense of UNAIDS in response to my intervention, during the question AND answer period at the NGO forum, saying the it was not feasable to say that poverty leads to AIDS without falling into the Duisberg idea, etc. I replied a bit strongly to her, cutting her short. 


That was it. I hope it gives an overview.

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