ABSTRACT

Health is now firmly established on the global political agenda. With varying degrees of prominence, health issues have been discussed at every summit of the G7/G8 since 2001. As noted in Chapter 11, the value of development assistance for health roughly quadrupled between 1990 and 2007 – a quantitative phenomenon that was accompanied qualitatively by the emergence of important new sources of aid (notably the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation) and channels for disbursing aid (most notably the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria). The years 2010 and 2011 saw no fewer than four major diplomatic meetings on health or health-related issues: the High-Level Plenary Meeting of the UN General Assembly on the Millennium Development Goals (subsequently MDG Summit) in September 2010; the UN High-Level Meeting on AIDS in June 2011; the UN High-Level Meeting on Non-communicable Diseases (NCDs; subsequently NCD Summit) in September of that year; and the World Conference on Social Determinants of Health in Brazil (subsequently WCSDH) the following month. Although it is important not to confuse flurries of meetings with genuine progress toward improving the health of populations, it is also important not to neglect the significance of such events or the political commitment (even at the level of rhetoric) that they reflect.