We must act now, across stakeholders and sectors, to support vulnerable communities and adopt a human-centred approach to save and transform the lives of those heavily affected by these crises.
This is the ethos of the WHO’s Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (PMNCH), the world’s largest alliance for women’s, children’s, and adolescent health, with more than 1,300 members drawn from 192 countries.
In particular, we must pursue three critical priorities: political leadership, innovative financing and meaningful partnerships.
1. Political leadership
Solid political leadership means both action and accountability. It involves the will to make deliberate policy decisions to accelerate progress for women, children and adolescents, especially the most vulnerable. Effective leadership is essential to champion collaboration for health and to engage women and girls meaningfully in health systems and multi-sectoral reforms.
This is fundamental in the run-up to the UN’s High-Level Meeting on Universal Health Coverage in New York in September 2023, which aims to address the needs of this population.
2. Innovative financing
Innovative financing, focused on solutions that protect the rights of the most vulnerable, is also crucial. Social impact financing, blended financing and domestic funding from non-established players, such as local small and medium enterprises, all have a role to play. This is important because we know that investing in the continuum of care for women, children, and adolescents provides an excellent long-term return for societies. Every dollar invested in child immunisation brings at least $20 in benefits. And every dollar invested in selected adolescent health interventions yields a 10-fold return in health, social and economic benefits.
3. Meaningful partnerships
Meaningful partnerships must play an integral part in developing and scaling up these new financing models. Intersectoral collaboration is crucial.
The collective endeavour can be powerful in pioneering research, developing digital interventions for health and championing inter-sectoral financing. Recent and massive investments in COVID-19 responses also provide us with opportunities to support and sustain health-systems strengthening in the long term.
