The right to health: a duty for whom?

International Symposium
2 December 2004
Basel, Switzerland

Background

A child born in Zambia or Zimbabwe has an average life expectancy of 33 years. If she or he is lucky enough to be born in Switzerland, life expectancy rises to 79 years. In some African countries, two out of ten children die before the age of five. In the poorest countries, public health services have a budget of only eight Swiss Francs per resident. Three of these eight Francs are provided by international aid. In comparison, the annual cost of public health services in Switzerland amounts to 6000 Swiss Francs per person.

It is no coincidence that reducing death rates of children and mothers, reducing HIV/ AIDS and malaria infections, and also improving access to clean drinking water are priorities on the international community’s list of Millennium Development Goals. The Commission on Macroeconomics and Health, under the chair of Jeffrey Sachs, has demanded an additional annual 31 billion US Dollars to fund health services until 2015 to avoid eight million deaths per year.

Article 25 of the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights pledges the right to adequate living standards, which includes the right to a healthy way of life. Is there a right to health that exceeds every human being’s ethical demand for human dignity and integrity? This question has been internationally debated for a decade.

There is broad consensus on the following assertions: The request for better health is not only made with regard to public health services but also to all aspects of life, including gender equality. The right to health can only be fulfilled in a society that successfully fights poverty and whose government is accountable to its people for the things it does and does not do. Functional public health services are nothing more and nothing less than a piece of the puzzle of well-being.

Whose duty is it to implement the right to health? Is it the task of governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) or the private sector? What is the role of the government if the market fails? What is the role of NGOs if the government fails? Or could the private sector organise the health sector more successfully?

Often, the pharmaceutical industry is heavily criticized. High drug prices inhibit access to effective treatment for people suffering from HIV/AIDS, for example. The industry’s research priorities are criticized as well. It is said that pharmaceutical companies do not take into account the need of hundreds of millions of people suffering from poverty-related diseases because these patients lack the purchasing power. What is the practical meaning of the right to health for a pharmaceutical company such as Novartis?

The symposium will bring together internationally renowned personalities to discuss this subject in a controversial manner and review it from different perspectives. In this way, the Novartis Foundation for Sustainable Development aims to make a valuable contribution to an issue of great societal importance.