As the 2015 Millennium Development Goals (MDG) deadline looms nearer, global leaders must re-evaluate initiatives for the post-2015 development agenda. As enumerated in the final and eighth MDG, the original development goals inherently rely on donor aid and multilateral financial partnerships for progression. With less than a few months before the global deadline, five of the eight goals are not likely to be achieved. MDG Five, created to reduce maternal mortality rates (MMR), measures dead last on fulfillment.
Robust human rights integration into the post-2015 development agenda could produce more sustainable development by encouraging system reform rather than development via donor aid. The most prominent current global health initiatives place an emphasis on delivering cost-effective treatments and selective programs that are not only intermittently available at best, but also depend on donor financial funding. For example, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Roll Back Malaria Partnership, Stop TB, and Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization programs rely on wealthy countries or private funding to provide limited time health care relief. While such programs promote healthier populations at the time they are administered, because they do not fundamentally change health systems, the communities they serve are not actually developing.
Evidence in health care system reform in low to middle-income countries indicate that institutional recognition of the right to health care access results in decreased rates of maternal mortality and an increase in the overall health of a country’s population. Aside from sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia has the world’s highest rates of maternal mortality. Southeast Asian countries that have acknowledged the right to health care access and have subsequently strived toward universal health care coverage, have significantly lower maternal mortality rates (MMR). Countries that do not include institutionally recognized health care access rights have not seen measurable progress on MMR. Thus, development through system reform may be more sustainable than initiatives that rely on intermittent and unevenly distributed financial donations.
On average, nearly 50 percent of health care financing in Southeast Asia comes from out-of-pocket payments (OOP). A global health study featured in the New England Journal of Medicine calculates that only 38 percent of health care financing in low-income countries is combined in funding pools, as compared to 60 and 80 percent in middle- and high-income countries. In countries where the majority of the population cannot afford private health care coverage, public health insurance programs can ensure equal access to health care across all population demographics. Human rights acknowledgement, such as the right to health care access, can realistically achieve sustained development. In the case of Southeast Asia, government development initiatives that promote health care access human rights have a significant impact on the health of women.
The UN Charter acknowledges “human rights” in order to “promote social progress;” the international importance of human rights is also centrally recognized in the 1948 UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. However, the MDGs do not once reference human rights. As numerous development scholars, including Louise Arbour, former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, indicate, human rights and development are interdependent.
In establishing the post-2015 development agenda, the international community has a tremendous opportunity to reform international development processes. As the world strives toward the eradication of poverty, integrated human rights, and development initiatives may encourage robust, sustainable system change. Acknowledging human rights within development programs builds the capacity within states to further development progress after donor aid desists. When local governments recognize human rights, development accountability is in the hands of the people and not international institutions; voluntary aid can work jointly with government rather than around it.
Tianna Tu represents Utah as a 2014 Truman Scholar. She is currently a health care analyst at Leavitt Partners and an editor at Ultimate Resumes.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's September/October 2014 print edition.
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Post-2015 Development Agenda and Human Rights Integration
September 18, 2014
As the 2015 Millennium Development Goals (MDG) deadline looms nearer, global leaders must re-evaluate initiatives for the post-2015 development agenda. As enumerated in the final and eighth MDG, the original development goals inherently rely on donor aid and multilateral financial partnerships for progression. With less than a few months before the global deadline, five of the eight goals are not likely to be achieved. MDG Five, created to reduce maternal mortality rates (MMR), measures dead last on fulfillment.
Robust human rights integration into the post-2015 development agenda could produce more sustainable development by encouraging system reform rather than development via donor aid. The most prominent current global health initiatives place an emphasis on delivering cost-effective treatments and selective programs that are not only intermittently available at best, but also depend on donor financial funding. For example, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Roll Back Malaria Partnership, Stop TB, and Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization programs rely on wealthy countries or private funding to provide limited time health care relief. While such programs promote healthier populations at the time they are administered, because they do not fundamentally change health systems, the communities they serve are not actually developing.
Evidence in health care system reform in low to middle-income countries indicate that institutional recognition of the right to health care access results in decreased rates of maternal mortality and an increase in the overall health of a country’s population. Aside from sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia has the world’s highest rates of maternal mortality. Southeast Asian countries that have acknowledged the right to health care access and have subsequently strived toward universal health care coverage, have significantly lower maternal mortality rates (MMR). Countries that do not include institutionally recognized health care access rights have not seen measurable progress on MMR. Thus, development through system reform may be more sustainable than initiatives that rely on intermittent and unevenly distributed financial donations.
On average, nearly 50 percent of health care financing in Southeast Asia comes from out-of-pocket payments (OOP). A global health study featured in the New England Journal of Medicine calculates that only 38 percent of health care financing in low-income countries is combined in funding pools, as compared to 60 and 80 percent in middle- and high-income countries. In countries where the majority of the population cannot afford private health care coverage, public health insurance programs can ensure equal access to health care across all population demographics. Human rights acknowledgement, such as the right to health care access, can realistically achieve sustained development. In the case of Southeast Asia, government development initiatives that promote health care access human rights have a significant impact on the health of women.
The UN Charter acknowledges “human rights” in order to “promote social progress;” the international importance of human rights is also centrally recognized in the 1948 UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. However, the MDGs do not once reference human rights. As numerous development scholars, including Louise Arbour, former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, indicate, human rights and development are interdependent.
In establishing the post-2015 development agenda, the international community has a tremendous opportunity to reform international development processes. As the world strives toward the eradication of poverty, integrated human rights, and development initiatives may encourage robust, sustainable system change. Acknowledging human rights within development programs builds the capacity within states to further development progress after donor aid desists. When local governments recognize human rights, development accountability is in the hands of the people and not international institutions; voluntary aid can work jointly with government rather than around it.
Tianna Tu represents Utah as a 2014 Truman Scholar. She is currently a health care analyst at Leavitt Partners and an editor at Ultimate Resumes.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's September/October 2014 print edition.
