M8 Alliance Declaration: From Words to Action World Health Summit 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic is far from over and we have to explore and implement innovative and effective measures to defeat this virus and to prepare for future threats.

The World Health Summit joins the voices that call for a new multilateralism and a new social contract.

Determination, cooperation and good leadership are required. Leaders need to act with determination to fight the pandemic nationally and globally. Societies and their representatives must also engage with foresight, in order to put into place a coherent ecosystem that will significantly improve pandemic preparedness and response. Jointly they must address flaws in the local and international governance mechanisms that proved to be inadequate during the crises.

There must be an end to the cycles of panic and neglect.
A new approach is needed, not only for pandemic threats but also for other risks such as climate change, chronic diseases and food security – any preparedness and response strategies must move beyond silos and beyond a predominantly national focus. Risks are global and political priorities must reflect this. No one is safe until everyone is safe.

The World Health Summit and its partners together with the M8 Alliance call for determined action to:

• achieve vaccine equity by overcoming vaccine nationalism and vaccine hesitancy by sharing vaccines, increasing production in the global south, and supporting a TRIPS waiver;
• strengthening the efforts of partners from the Global South with the aim of developing more contextualized and effective approaches to global health challenges;
• strengthen global health architecture in the face of a fragmentation and decoupling of global health decision making; and
• support all countries to invest in Primary Health Care as the foundation of health systems and pandemic preparedness and end the underinvestment in public health, and recognize the contribution of women.

But that is not enough.

Political leaders must confront the underlying geopolitical tensions, social vulnerabilities and structural inequalities in their societies and between countries – it is the most vulnerable that are paying the price with their health and lives in this pandemic.

The World Health Summit stresses the fact that health is a human right and health security will only be achieved together with social and human security. Mechanisms driving and perpetuating inequity must be addressed.

The World Health Summit proposes 7 priority areas for action by political leaders to give global health structural and operational strength which corresponds to its impact on quality of life of people worldwide :

1. To ensure a global health governance approach that is backed and supported by all countries, and that values equity in health for all.
2. To move from an ad hoc, charity-based model of development assistance to a sustainable and predictable financing model that allows reliable pandemic preparedness and response mechanisms – the G20 proposals must lay the basis for such an approach in 2021 and beyond.
3. To strengthen the constitutional mandate of the World Health Organisation politically and financially, through a significant increase in the assessed contributions by member states.
4. To increase cooperation between health and other sectors, such as finance and education, to achieve a common understanding of the domestic and global investments required to achieve better health, and to build a new economics of health for all that supports Primary Health Care and invests in a stronger health workforce.
5. To establish a multilateral health architecture built on trust, mutual accountability, information sharing and transparency, including data solidarity.
6. To increase the support of integrated preparedness approaches such as ONEHEALTH, planetary health and integration of key global health issues like women’s health, mental health and NCDs in health systems.
7. To provide a strong binding political agreement and overarching umbrella on pandemic preparedness and response through negotiating a global Pandemic Treaty.

We call on the French and Czech Presidencies of the European Union to maintain strong support for multilateralism, and to lead the way for a new global social contract for pandemic preparedness. We call on the G7/G20 Presidencies 2022 of Germany and Indonesia to drive forward the vaccine equity agenda, and support the urgent governance and financing measures required to make it happen.