New technology companies need the oxygen of someone else’s money to survive and grow, that’s how capitalism works. Here in California, multi-million dollar investments and eye-watering billion dollar company valuations are everyday news. The ultimate goal of new technology companies is to gain “unicorn” status as rapidly as possible i.e. be valued at more than […]
Category: Global health
Mihail Călin: The impact of the refugee crisis on European health systems
This year, those participants at the European Health Forum Gastein who were not too busy moving from one session to another, too eager to rub shoulders with top level speakers, or too absorbed in the beautiful landscape, could witness a new reality: refugees had arrived in Bad Hofgastein. There are 55 of them, 25 of […]
Richard Hurley: Meeting the Syrian refugees arriving on a small Greek island
On Tuesday 13 October, while on holiday off the beaten track on the tiny Greek island of Amorgos, I heard that a boat of refugees had landed for the fourth time this year, bringing the total number of refugees who have landed here in 2015 to about 250. At about 17:30, George Alahouzos, a builder and volunteer with […]
Roger Kneebone and Sally Frampton: Looking back through the keyhole
A surgical generation has passed since the introduction of keyhole surgery in the late 1980s. In that time the landscape of surgery has changed beyond recognition. In less than three decades, minimally invasive (keyhole) surgery has moved from being a controversial and contested experimental approach (generating all the debate and opposition which innovations usually entail) […]
Richard Smith: How global health can help the NHS
Africa has 25% of the global health burden and 2% of the health workforce. In contrast, North America has 2% of the health burden but 25% of the health workforce. This is the inverse care law (those who need healthcare the most get the least) on a gargantuan scale. And now the US is trying […]
Desmond O’Neill: Welcoming the new ageing in a global context
Expenditure in older populations is an investment, not a cost, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) With relatively little fanfare, the World Report on Ageing and Health—one of the most important WHO documents in recent years—was launched in New York to coincide with the UN International Day of Older Persons on 1 October. It represents a […]
Jocalyn Clark: Predatory journals debate raises controversies—but they’re not going away
I think it’s fair to say that the topic of so-called predatory journals was the hot one at the recent World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) conference. The meeting coincided with the publication of new evidence of the enormous growth of the market of predatory open access journals. Shen and Bjork reported in BMC Medicine […]
Jocalyn Clark: World Association of Medical Editors’ first conference—an international affair
For its first ever conference, the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) chose New Delhi, India as the inaugural location—a reflection of the global nature of medical science and publishing, and to emphasise the organisation’s growing commitment to global health. Over three days this past week, 220 delegates from 17 countries learned about professionalism and […]
Arthy Santhakumar: What makes the new global goals different?
The end is in sight. Or more accurately the beginning. Following three lengthy years of negotiations, we have a new (and improved) sustainable development agenda for global action—The Global Goals. The world has agreed on our global priorities, and only time will tell whether we can hold—and be held—to our promises. […]
Sara Bennett and Kabir Sheikh: How the new global goals can help drive systems to address health challenges better
The fact that the sustainable development goals have only one solitary goal for health has been criticised by many with concerns that it signals a new more diluted and less ambitious era in global health. We disagree. We believe that the sustainable development goals promise a significant improvement for global health over what went before. […]