Global Investment Framework and Lancet Series Lay Out Vision for Achieving Global Convergence in Health by 2035

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By: Sarah Blake, MHTF consultant

Today, The Lancet launched a special issue featuring the Global health 2035: a world converging within a generation, a report by the Lancet’s Commission on Investing in Health which lays out a vision for dramatically improving health and reducing disparities in health by 2035. The report follows up on the seminal Investing in Health, the 1993 World Development Report, offering a more comprehensive view and even stronger evidence of the economic case for investments in health, with both an agenda for future action and a review of the evidence of major achievements in improving health since the 1993 WDR was published.

From the “Global health 2035” report:

A unique characteristic of our generation is that collectively we have the financial and the ever-improving technical capacity to reduce infectious, child, and maternal mortality rates to low levels universally by 2035, to achieve a “grand convergence” in health. With enhanced investments to scale up health technologies and systems, these rates in most low-income and middle-income countries would fall to those presently seen in the best-performing middle-income countries. Achievement of convergence would prevent about 10 million deaths in 2035 across low-income and lower-middle-income countries relative to a scenario of stagnant investments and no improvements in technology.

Along with the Lancet Commission’s work on the economic case for health investments, the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (PMNCH) recently published resources on the new Global Investment Framework for Women’s and Children’s health, which was published in November in the Lancet and offers a complement to the “Global health 2035” report. The investment framework complements the Lancet Commission’s work, presenting evidence on the potential health, economic and social benefits of investments in priority interventions across the spectrum of reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health.
From PMNCH’s new Knowledge Summary on the New Global Investment Framework on Women’s and Children’s Health:

Investing in women’s and children’s health will secure substantial health, social and economic returns. Increasing health expenditure by only US$ 5 per capita per year until 2035 (equivalent to US$ 30 billion per year, and in per capita terms representing a 2% increase in current spending) in the 74 high-burden countries could result in up to nine times that value in economic and social benefits. These benefits include greater GDP growth through improved productivity, as well as avoiding the preventable deaths of 147 million children, 32 million stillbirths, and 5 million women between 2013- 2035.

Additional resources on the Global Investment Framework include a presentation and brochure.