No progress without access

​Headquarter activities

No progress without access : How can we make sure global health products reach the poor?

Sabine Unternährer

_{©Swiss Malaria Group/Beatriz Galatas}

On October 17, SDC hosted a meeting with the title "No progress without access : How can we make sure global health products reach the poor?" in Geneva. The event brought together a wide range of stakeholders from product development partnerships (PDPs), academia, international health and access organizations, industry, donors, endemic countries and civil society. It aimed at strengthening links between PDPs, international health and access related organizations, as well as a variety of other relevant stakeholders, taking up the access issue from the specific angle of product development for the poor.

After a short introduction to the Swiss approach to access to medical products (#A2M_Switzerland), two diverse panels discussed the various access existing barriers to access and on how these could be addressed so that products reach the poor. The first panel focused on the question of prioritization of R&D for new medical products to better match public health needs of low- and middle-income countries. A second panel highlighted how access could be more systematically integrated into product development. The panelists pointed out not only the need for improved and continued alignment between all actors, but also the need to integrate approaches into a wider field of multisectoral action.

Access to global health products is critical for achieving health for all, but it is also a complex global challenge at the interface between health, development, economics and politics. Both the physical availability and geographical accessibility, but also cultural acceptability, and financial affordability of medicines, vaccines, diagnostics and other global health products of assured quality need to be addressed in order to achieve the overarching goal of universal health coverage and the Sustainable Development Goals.

The product development partnerships, along with other international stakeholders, have made critical contributions to fostering access to global health products for those whose medical needs are most neglected. Despite enormous progress during the last 15 years, still two billion people worldwide have no access to a range of vital global health products.

This event was organized within the context of the PDP Funders Group, of which SDC is a member. The PDP Funders Group is an informal network of public and private organizations providing financial support to one or more product development partnerships developing new health technologies-

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