PHM-Exch> Civil society meeting ahead of WHA73, Friday 15 May 2020: Register now
Thomas Schwarz
schwarz at medicusmundi.org
Sun May 10 22:49:55 PDT 2020
Dear colleagues,
I herewith draw your attention to the civil society meeting ahead of the
World Health Assembly, taking place on Friday this week. The meeting is
organized by the Geneva Global Health Hub (PHM and MMI being members of it).
Find the announcement below. Registration is open now. Please register in
advance. For technical reasons, last minute registration during the meeting
itself will not be possible.
Thanks, and hoping to see some of you there!
Best regards,
Thomas, MMI Network
..................................
G2H2 Civil society meeting on Friday, 15 May 2020, 15.00-17:30 hrs CEST
A World Health Assembly in times of a dual crisis:
Covid-19 and the collapse of multilateralism as we have known it
Announcement and programme: <http://g2h2.org/posts/15may2020/> here and
below
Zoom registration page:
<https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Sn-f1r21RR2GfxxVagZdJw> here
Feel free to forward to team members and civil society colleagues
..................................
Dear G2H2 members,
Dear colleagues
With the WHO at the heart of a fierce geopolitical tension between the US
and China, and large in-person meetings banned in Geneva for the time being
due to the Coronavirus crisis, it has been decided that WHA73 and EB147
will both be held “virtually”, using video conference technology. Non-State
Actors can upload statements but not present them in these proceedings.
According to the WHO Secretariat, both meetings will entirely focus on
Covid-19 and elections of EB members. Other technical issues are postponed.
As civil society actors, we need to adapt ourselves to Covid-19
uncertainties, but this new (temporary?) normal will hopefully enhance our
ingenuity. Since we cannot meet in person for the usual G2H2 civil society
meeting before the WHA in Geneva, the G2H2 Steering Committee has agreed to
use this opportunity to also convene in the virtual space.
The civil society meeting on 15 May will allow members of the Geneva Global
Health Hub and other civil society colleagues to share their views of the
World Health Assembly in the current crisis of multilateralism that is
accentuated by the Covid-19 pandemic. The discussion will be structured
along two (interrelated) thematic fields:
1. Looking ahead to WHA73: Can the World Health Assembly uphold its status
as the most relevant forum to negotiate global public health particularly in
a major global health crisis?
2. Beyond the World Health Assembly: How successfully is WHO defending and
shaping its role as the “leading and coordinating global health authority”?
Or is the Covid19 pandemic the last straw for this multilateral institution
in the middle of a wider crisis of multilateralism?
Each thematic field will be introduced by initial inputs (G2H2 members
and/or invited guests), followed by a moderated democratic discussion among
all participants who want to contribute.
Despite the challenges of a video conference platform, we hope to safeguard
some of the “brainstorming” character of G2H2 civil society meetings, and
have therefore set it up as a closed meeting that will not be broadcast and
with access to civil society only. The meeting with focus on civil society
strategizing and will need registration ahead of the event.
Our discussions will be continued and deepened at a second civil society
meeting, on 26 May, based on civil society assessments of the outcomes of
WHA73.
The programme of the meeting on 15 May:
..................................
15. 00 - 16.10 hrs: Welcome, topic and discussion 1
Can the World Health Assembly uphold its status as the most relevant forum
to negotiate global public health particularly in a major global health
crisis?
..................................
After the US President’s attack on the World Health Organization, member
states, public health experts and civil society rallied behind the WHO,
highlighting and acknowledging the WHO’s role as provider of sound public
health guidance in managing the Covid-19 crisis and being much more
responsive than in the Ebola outbreak 2014 in West Africa.
However, national governments have not respected WHO guidance, particularly
in the preparedness for, and response to the global crisis once it was
declared a public health emergency of international concern on January 31.
The existing instrument for dealing with global health emergencies, the
International Health Regulations, obviously lacks an enforcement mechanism.
We all are fully aware of the political and economic determinants of health,
health systems and health politics. However, with the Covid-19 pandemic, the
trend to “politicize” global health policy, in a sense of using and framing
it for political gains, has become more overt.
We might see a WHA73 further dominated and distorted by the polarity (new
Cold War?) between the US and China, with the Taiwan issue (proposed
resolution requesting Taiwan’s observer status) and the demand for an
“independent investigation into the origin of the Covid-19 virus” as another
proxy battlefield.
But we also see an EU proposal for a general Covid-19 resolution that has
triggered intense negotiations among WHO member states and a flurry of
critical comments and suggestions by civil society and experts on how to
deal with this pandemic and practice global solidarity in times of Covid-19,
including controversial issues such as access to Covid-19 medicines,
vaccines and diagnostics, whilst safeguarding human rights. Hopefully, such
urgent policy debates on “what needs to be done” and “how to do it” to
overcome the pandemic will remain at the core of the World Health Assembly.
Leading questions
· What to expect from the World Health Assembly? And what is the place
of civil society?
· What statements / interventions in WHA73 are you planning?
(G2H2 members are invited to get in touch with <mailto:info at g2h2.org>
Thomas ahead of the meeting for flagging their interest to provide a 1-3
Minutes input)
· How to critically assess the “political” in global health? Is the
current politicization of the debates helping or hurting WHO’s authority in
the global health arena?
Panel
· Introduction: Andreas Wulf, medico international, G2H2 president
· Guest speaker: Priti Patnaik, journalist (tbc)
· Moderation: Mareike Haase, Bread for the World, coordinator of G2H2
working group on WHO and global health governance and financing
..................................
16.10 – 16.20 h Break
The chat will remain open
..................................
16.20 h – 17.30 hrs: Topic and discussion 2
Beyond the World Health Assembly: How successfully is WHO defending and
shaping its role as the “leading and coordinating global health authority”?
..................................
Multilateralism can be understood as countries’ membership in democratic
international (UN) institutions that serve to negotiate and find common
solutions to global issues, bind all and particularly the powerful nations,
to global agreements and treaties, discourage unilateralism, and give small
nations a voice and influence that they could not otherwise exercise.
This UN multilateralism was in a crisis even before the Covid-19 crisis,
including in global health, where the entry of competing actors and
initiatives has muddied its governance and legitimacy. This development has
side-lined, intentionally weakened and crowded out the WHO as the mandated
multilateral institution for global public health. Private sector entities
are now invited to every multi-stakeholder platform and public private
partnership as the uncontested model for solutions to the world’s problems.
The Covid-19 crisis has brought WHO to the forefront of global health
politics, raising new geopolitical controversies about the autonomy and
policy mandate of this UN specialized agency vis-à-vis other global actors
and its member states.
Do these controversies present an opportunity for revived multilateralism
with a stronger role of WHO in the global health and foreign policy arena?
Or is the “real music” playing to the tunes of EU and G20 together with the
World Economic Forum and philanthropic foundations, and with the WHO as mere
convener and facilitator (if ever) and the WHO DG only a symbolic
figurehead?
Leading questions
· What multilateralism and what WHO are we defending, as civil society?
· How should we address the current shortcomings and cracks of
multilateralism, e.g. the dominance of the economic elites, the lack of
civil society access, and the uncontested participation of authoritarian
regimes?
· What would be the basic elements of a civil society political
strategy advocating for international health cooperation and solidarity,
democratic multilateralism, and a strong, pluriform, United Nations?
Panel
· Introduction: Nicoletta Dentico, SID, G2H2 SC member
· Guest speaker: Nadia Urbinati, Colombia University
· Guest speaker: Ilchheong Yi, UNRISD (invited)
· Moderation: Remco van de Pas, MMI Network, G2H2 SC member
..................................
Conference platform and registration
..................................
The meeting will take place on Zoom, set up as “Zoom webinar”.
Registration for the meeting is open now.
Meeting website: <http://g2h2.org/posts/15may2020/>
http://g2h2.org/posts/15may2020/
Registration website:
<https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Sn-f1r21RR2GfxxVagZdJw>
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Sn-f1r21RR2GfxxVagZdJw
Help us to promote the meeting by reaching out to civil society colleagues
via e-mail and <https://twitter.com/G2H2_Geneva> Twitter.
Deadline for registration: Friday 15 May, 13.00 hrs CEST. Your registration
will be confirmed within a working day (until Thursday 14 May) or within an
hour (Friday 15 May).
..................................
A closed civil society meeting - and a protected space
..................................
The meeting is set up as a protected space for civil society brainstorming
and strategizing and will therefore not be broadcast or recorded.
In the meeting we will request participants to follow Chatham House Rules:
information and positions disclosed during the meeting may be reported by
those present, but the source of the information may not be explicitly or
implicitly identified. So do not quote statements, but feel free to provide
general insights into our debate, e.g. via Twitter, using #WHA73.
Contact for enquiries:
Thomas Schwarz, G2H2 Secretariat
<mailto:info at g2h2.org> info at g2h2.org
Stay safe and healthy!
Spread solidarity, not the virus!
Geneva Global Health Hub
Thomas Schwarz, Secretariat
Route de Ferney 150, CP 2100
1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland
<http://www.g2h2.org/> www.g2h2.org – <mailto:info at g2h2.org>
info at g2h2.org
Phone +41 22 920 08 06
SMS +41 79 645 01 37
logo_G2H2_with-bg_RGB
“We build a strong civil society space in Geneva
for more democratic global health governance.”
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