The following recommendations arose from the NGO Forum Workshop on

Enhancing Productive Capacities in Health in LDCs.

Professor Mathura P. Shresha

(Check Against Delivery)

1. Workshop participants drew attention to the urgent need for a commitment by national governments, bilateral and multilateral funders and NGOs to strengthening health services. They called for increased and long-term financial support to meet the International Development Targets by 2015, and recommended that health related loans should be transferred to grants.

2. They welcomed the allocation of new funding for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, but warned against vertical programming that would undermine overall support to health services.

3. Participants pointed to the need to extend the use of global funds for R&D to encompass the requirements for new drugs for neglected diseases, and that these funds should not only be invested in finding solutions to HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. Neglected diseases afflict large numbers of people in LDCs, whose plight has been for too long ignored.

4. The meeting emphasised that a cost effective means to promote health and social development in LDCs was through meeting the reproductive health needs of women. In Ethiopia, for example, 1400 women per 100,000 die in childbirth; and in Pakistan 10% of deaths are accounted for by adolescent girls. Illegal and unsafe' abortion, female genital mutilation and women's susceptibility to sexually transmitted infections are compounded by the disempowerment of women and young people in society. The workshop noted that maternal mortality rates are a key indicator of the effectiveness of reproductive and overall health services.

5. Finally, workshop participants stressed the importance of ensuring access to essential drugs for the viable functioning of health services, and in the control of public health. They expressed concerns that the TRIPS Agreement undermines access to affordable drugs, and that few LDCs have the resources to enable them to successfully use the safeguards outlined in TRIPS. LDCs should therefore be granted greater flexibility, recognising their exceptional circumstances.

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