Global Health Governance

Global health is not something that happens to people elsewhere – it is a shared context in which we all are born, lead our lives and die (cheery beginning). Recognizing a shared context in no way implies it is not a context rife with inequities, inequalities, and inefficiencies; it is. In the aftermath of the recent Ebola and Zika outbreaks and against a decades-long fight confronting HIV/AIDS and a millennia-long fight against tuberculosis and malaria, these fissures have been repeatedly exposed, and at times addressed. In the past decade alone, the world has invested billions of dollars in fighting these and other diseases but substantially less to help strengthen developing country health systems, expand health insurance coverage or combat the so-called neglected diseases, such as sleeping sickness, that continue to cause untold suffering. The institutions charged with ‘governing’ global health arguably do not have the requisite mandates, authorities or budgets to meet their respective missions, despite increasing amounts of pressure from donor governments, developing country governments and other constituents to do so. In this course, we will explore questions such as: Which entities govern and finance global health? What is on and off the global health agenda? Who determines what is on the global health agenda? What are recent ‘innovations’ in global health governance and financing? Have various ‘innovations’ worked or not? What are current significant debates in global health governance (e.g., what should World Health Organization reform entail)?