Global Health In Practice Investing Amidst Pandemics Denial Of Evidence And Neo Dependency

The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare the world's vulnerabilities to health and economic ruin from disease outbreaks. But the pandemic merely reveals fundamental weaknesses and contradictions in global health. What are the roots of discontents in global health? How do geo-politics, power dynamics, knowledge gaps, racism, and corruption affect global health? Is foreign aid for health due for a radical overhaul?This book is an incisive guide to the practice of global health in real life. Global health policy is at a crossroads. It is on trial at the interface between the Global North and the Global South. There has been remarkable progress in health outcomes over the past century. Yet, countries face a complex landscape of lofty ambitions in the form of political commitments to Universal Health Coverage, Human Capital, and Global Health Security. These ambitions are tempered by multiple constraints. Investors in global health must navigate a minefield of uneven progress, great expectations, and denials of scientific evidence by entrenched interests. That terrain is further complicated by the hegemonic suppression of innovation that threatens the status quo and by self-perpetuating cycles of dependency of the Global South on the Global North.This book is an unflinching scrutiny of concepts and cases by a veteran of global health policy and practice. It holds a mirror to the world and lays out pathways to a better future. The book is a must-have GPS for policy makers and practitioners as they navigate the maze of global health.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare the world's vulnerabilities to health and economic ruin from disease outbreaks. But the pandemic merely reveals fundamental weaknesses and contradictions in global health. What are the roots of discontents in global health? How do geo-politics, power dynamics, knowledge gaps, racism, and corruption affect global health? Is foreign aid for health due for a radical overhaul? This book is an incisive guide to the practice of global health in real life. Global health policy is at a crossroads. It is on trial at the interface between the Global North and the Global South. There has been remarkable progress in health outcomes over the past century. Yet, countries face a complex landscape of lofty ambitions in the form of political commitments to Universal Health Coverage, Human Capital, and Global Health Security. These ambitions are tempered by multiple constraints. Investors in global health must navigate a minefield of uneven progress, great expectations, and denials of scientific evidence by entrenched interests. That terrain is further complicated by the hegemonic suppression of innovation that threatens the status quo and by self-perpetuating cycles of dependency of the Global South on the Global North. This book is an unflinching scrutiny of concepts and cases by a veteran of global health policy and practice. It holds a mirror to the world and lays out pathways to a better future. The book is a must-have GPS for policy makers and practitioners as they navigate the maze of global health"--

Offers a look at the causes and effects of poverty and inequality, as well as the possible solutions. This title features research, human stories, statistics, and compelling arguments. It discusses about the world we live in and how we can make it a better place.

'A compelling contribution to our evolving understanding of the links between trade, aid and security and what the international community needs to do to ensure peace and development in the world.' Achim Steiner, Executive Director, United Nations Environment Programme 'For far too long the international community ahs stood by while countries around the world descend into conflict and anarchy. We need to understand how we can engage more effectively with fragile and failing states. Trade, Aid and Security is an important step in this direction.' Jan Pronk, Special Representative of the UN General Secretary in Sudan and Former Minister of Development and the Environment, The Netherlands. 'As we begin to contemplate what the post-Iraq world will look like it is vital that we reflect on the limits of the utility of hard power and the importance that development can play in avoiding failed states before they fail, preventing conflicts and more successfully re-building states. This timely book makes a most important contribution to that process.' Lord Paddy Ashdown, UN High Representative for Boznia and Herzegovina, 2002 2006 Leader of UK Liberal Democrat Party, 1988 1999 'As UN Special Representative to the Great Lakes Region of Africa I have seen the devastating impact of the trade in conflict resources with my own eyes. Amongst much else, this book shows how different trade and aid politics can tackle the trade in conflict resources and make a real contribution to secure societies. It is essential reading.' Mohamed Sahnoun, Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Central and East Africa. Iraq, Afghanistan, Darfur. All resonate loudly on the international stage, exposing and illustrating the intractable links between global security, control over naturals resources be it oil, water, timber or 'conflict diamonds' and the manipulation of foreign aid and international trade policy. This volume, written by leading authorities from across the globe, introduces the linkages between trade, aid and security, and exposes how inappropriate or misused trade and aid policy can and do undermine security and contribute to violence and the disintegration of national states. On a practical level they demonstrate how six key areas of trade and aid policy can be used to help forge stability and security, reduce the likelihood of armed conflict, and assist economic and political recovery in our war-torn world.

Public health & preventive medicine.

The Challenge of Slums presents the first global assessment of slums, emphasizing their problems and prospects. Using a newly formulated operational definition of slums, it presents estimates of the number of urban slum dwellers and examines the factors at all level, from local to global, that underlie the formation of slums as well as their social, spatial and economic characteristics and dynamics. It goes on to evaluate the principal policy responses to the slum challenge of the last few decades. From this assessment, the immensity of the challenges that slums pose is clear. Almost 1 billion people live in slums, the majority in the developing world where over 40 per cent of the urban population are slum dwellers. The number is growing and will continue to increase unless there is serious and concerted action by municipal authorities, governments, civil society and the international community. This report points the way forward and identifies the most promising approaches to achieving the United Nations Millennium Declaration targets for improving the lives of slum dwellers by scaling up participatory slum upgrading and poverty reduction programmes. The Global Report on Human Settlements is the most authoritative and up-to-date assessment of conditions and trends in the world's cities. Written in clear language and supported by informative graphics, case studies and extensive statistical data, it will be an essential tool and reference for researchers, academics, planners, public authorities and civil society organizations around the world.

The term 'natural disaster' is often used to refer to natural events such as earthquakes, hurricanes or floods. However, the phrase 'natural disaster' suggests an uncritical acceptance of a deeply engrained ideological and cultural myth. At Risk questions this myth and argues that extreme natural events are not disasters until a vulnerable group of people is exposed. The updated new edition confronts a further ten years of ever more expensive and deadly disasters and discusses disaster not as an aberration, but as a signal failure of mainstream 'development'. Two analytical models are provided as tools for understanding vulnerability. One links remote and distant 'root causes' to 'unsafe conditions' in a 'progression of vulnerability'. The other uses the concepts of 'access' and 'livelihood' to understand why some households are more vulnerable than others. Examining key natural events and incorporating strategies to create a safer world, this revised edition is an important resource for those involved in the fields of environment and development studies.

An illuminating, indispensable analysis of a watershed moment and its possible aftermath. For people and governments around the world, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic seemed to place the preservation of human life at odds with the pursuit of economic and social life. Yet this naive alternative belies the complexity of the entanglements the crisis has created and revealed not just between health and wealth but also around morality, knowledge, governance, culture, and everyday subsistence. Didier Fassin and Marion Fourcade have assembled an eminent team of scholars from across the social sciences to reflect on the myriad ways SARS-CoV-2 has entered, reshaped, or exacerbated existing trends and structures in every part of the globe. The contributors show how the disruptions caused by the pandemic have both hastened the rise of new social divisions and hardened old inequalities and dilemmas. An indispensable volume, Pandemic Exposures provides an illuminating analysis of this watershed moment and its possible aftermath.

The Democratic Education Network (DEN) is a collaborative group involving academicstaff and students that aims to organize and support the educational experience ofstudents at the University of Westminster. DEN has inspired students to engage locallyand globally.Since the outbreak of COVID-19, DEN has played a significant role engaging studentsonline, and aiming to facilitate their learning process. This book is a compilationof papers written by both students at the University of Westminster and its partnerinternational universities. The book brings together different topics and conceptsrelated to the governance and management of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Itanalyses the political, economic, and social impact of COVID-19 on the agendas set bygovernments all around the world. This edition of the book is a manifestation of DEN’scollective teamwork.“I am so pleased to see the hard work of staff and students in the DemocraticEducation Network (DEN) come to fruition in this excellent publication. I recognisethe value of these collaborations in our turbulent times, and it is lovely to see studentsand academic staff from all over the world come together to develop meaningful,apposite, and challenging scholarship. Working in partnership with students is such astrength of the culture at the University of Westminster, and it is great to see this workdemonstrated so effectively in this text

The world is caught in the mesh of a series of environmental crises. So far attempts at resolving the deep basis of these have been superficial and disorganized. Global Political Ecology links the political economy of global capitalism with the political ecology of a series of environmental disasters and failed attempts at environmental policies. This critical volume draws together contributions from twenty-five leading intellectuals in the field. It begins with an introductory chapter that introduces the readers to political ecology and summarizes the books main findings. The following seven sections cover topics on the political ecology of war and the disaster state; fuelling capitalism: energy scarcity and abundance; global governance of health, bodies, and genomics; the contradictions of global food; capital’s marginal product: effluents, waste, and garbage; water as a commodity, a human right, and power; the functions and dysfunctions of the global green economy; political ecology of the global climate, and carbon emissions. This book contains accounts of the main currents of thought in each area that bring the topics completely up-to-date. The individual chapters contain a theoretical introduction linking in with the main themes of political ecology, as well as empirical information and case material. Global Political Ecology serves as a valuable reference for students interested in political ecology, environmental justice, and geography.