Global Public Health Leaders Warn about Political Leadership that Harms

Around the world, the rapid spread of the Delta variant is posing a grave threat to pandemic control, highlighting the critical need for effective leadership informed by the best available evidence, global public health leaders have warned.

Members of the Public Health Leadership Coalition, launched earlier this year by the World Federation of Public Health Associations (WFPHA), met on June 28 to share updates on the COVID-19 pandemic from their respective countries.

The meeting heard that political imperatives are driving harmful policies in some countries, such as reopening and hosting big gatherings, and that the pandemic is being prolonged by global inequities in access to COVID vaccines as well as vaccine hesitancy in many countries.

The leadership coalition, led by Prof. Walter Ricciardi, WFPHA president, is working with ministers of health from different countries and is calling on them to join forces to reduce the huge disparities in equities, regarding the supply of vaccines and beyond. Leaders stand ready to support the development and implementation of the WHO proposed Global Pandemic Treaty.

Value-based Vaccination Webinar

Value-Based Healthcare (VBHC) offers a new value(s)-based immunization approach for sustainable and resilient healthcare systems. Exploring the full value of vaccinations could allow better evaluation of health-related and care-related productivity gains, community externalities and impact on social responsibility and cohesion.

On June 30 at 10:30 – 12:00 (CEST), this webinar brought together experts from different fields to discuss the evidence on the full value of vaccinations. Furthermore, this event discussed how to promote the research on the topic and effective policy at supranational, regional, and national levels, to elevate the discourse on value-based decision-making in vaccinations.

This webinar is available to view by clicking on the link below.

Recommendations to Drive Value-based Decision-making in Vaccination

Vaccination as a public health intervention intrinsically provides broad value that goes beyond individual benefits.

Here, several recommendations are issued in order to drive broader dialogue and meaningful policy actions to facilitate value-based decision-making in vaccination.

The Value(S) of Vaccination: Building the Scientific Evidence according to a Value-Based Healthcare Approach

Vaccination as a public health intervention intrinsically provides broad value that goes beyond individual benefits. Research has shown that vaccination could determine health-related and care-related productivity gains (due to avoided diseases and need for care), community externalities (e.g. protection of non-vaccinated individuals) and also an improvement in social responsibility and cohesion. These cumulative benefits enable healthier more prosperous societies contributing to the achievement of all the Sustainable Development Goals as health is also a fundamental resource to development.

Increased investment in public vaccination programmes, recognition of the broader (direct and indirect) value of vaccines and improved program implementation will save lives and protect people throughout life course. Vaccination should be recognised as a high-value public health investment, not just in terms of reducing the burden of disease, but also as an economically and socially beneficial healthcare intervention.

The following executive summary is aimed to collect and synthetize the scientific evidence on the personal, societal, allocative, and technical value of vaccinations with the aim to issue recommendations to drive broader dialogue and meaningful policy actions to facilitate value-based vaccination.

4 Pillars to Support Value-based Healthcare

Value-based healthcare approach is a health outcome focused theoretical framework meant to support the appropriate allocation of resources and to ensure the sustainability of healthcare systems.

The concept of value in healthcare was introduced in 2010 and first linked to the efficiency criterion, namely achieved health gains compared to committed resources. However, value-based healthcare should not look at technical value in isolation, rather utilize a comprehensive approach that is built on four pillars to support solidarity-based healthcare systems:

• Personal value: refers to the appropriateness of care in respect to patients’ personal goals.
• Societal value: looks at the contribution of healthcare to social participation and connectedness.
• Allocative value: pinpoints to the equitable distribution of resources across patient groups.
• Technical value: that look at the efficiency of resource allocation.

These four pillars should be investigated before making every health and healthcare decision in order to foster sustainable and resilient healthcare systems.

The Casebook on Advocacy in Public Health Is Now Available!

The Global Charter for Public’s Health considers advocacy as a key function of public health. However, the study and teaching of advocacy and their application to improve population health remains neglected in many countries.

The World Federation of Public Health Associations (WFPHA) therefore publishes the Casebook on Advocacy in Public Health which serves as a tool for national public health associations and other actors to improve their capacity of influence on national public health policies through advocacy efforts.