September 06, 2007	Thursday	Sha'aban 23, 1428

LONDON, Sept 5: Prime Minister Gordon Brown, International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander, ministers from developing countries and donor countries, and leaders from all of the major health agencies and foundations on Wednesday launched a new international partnership that will hopefully help save millions of lives by helping build national health systems in some of the poorest countries in the world.

Seven ‘first wave’ countries in Africa and Asia will join the new International Health Partnership which is supported by donor governments and agencies.

The prime minister said: “There is no greater cause than that every man, woman and child in the world should be able to benefit from the best medicine and healthcare. And our vision today is that we can triumph over ancient scourges and for the first time in history conquer polio, TB, measles and then with further advances and initiatives, go on to address pneumonia, malaria and eventually HIV/AIDS.”

The International Health Partnership (IHP) is part of a renewed global push to meet the health Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – cutting child deaths improving maternal mortality and fighting major diseases. It aims to make health aid work better for poor countries by doing three things:

— focusing on improving health systems as a whole and, not just on individual diseases or issues;

— providing better coordination among donors; and

— developing and supporting countries’ own health plans.

The global donor community is said to be making a positive difference in its support of poor countries – the use of Zambia’s health services has increased by 40 per cent since being made cost-free in rural areas; the number of front-line health workers has doubled in Ethiopia from 6000 to 12,000 in two years; and in Burundi, the number of children receiving health care has nearly doubled since becoming free for under-fives last year.

To support the effective implementation of the International Health Partnership in the first wave partner countries, the UK will ensure that the resources are available to provide technical support to ministries of health and support stopgap solutions such as tackling the health worker shortage and the supply of medicines.

A compact was also signed by all partners of the International Health Partnership at the launch on Wednesday. The next step will be for individual country agreements to be negotiated for the first wave partner countries.

Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan; representatives of major NGOs; and trade unions are expected to back the new partnership.