Remco van de Pas

Centre for Planetary Health Policy

Presentation on post-growth economic principles, and why they matter from a health systems transformation perspective.

Within the global health field, progress is being made to adopt a justice and sustainability-centred approach by advancing what has been named a planetary health agenda. Meanwhile, an increasing number of global health scholars argue for the decolonisation of the field. Yet, amongst these collective efforts to ‘transform’ global health thinking, a...

China is an indispensable actor to global health. Given the sheer size of its population, epidemiological history, and its economic development, China is obviously a vital element in creating and maintaining sustainable strategies to contribute to health-related sustainable development goals (SDGs), prevent and mitigate the spread of future epidemi...

Policy analysis why it is needed to act urgently on on The Commercial Determinants of Health (CDoH). Written for the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation - Geneva Office. https://rosalux-geneva.org/it-is-time-to-act-on-the-commercial-determinants-of-health/

The World Health Organization’s Global Strategy on Human Resources for Health: Workforce 2030 identified a projected shortfall of 18 million health workers by 2030, primarily in low- and middle-income countries. The need for investment was re-enforced by the 2016 report and recommendations of the United Nations High-Level Commission on Health Emplo...

Can planetary health escape a technocratic tunnel vision on climate and health adaptation and contribute to contextualised, participatory policy actions that improve health equity? In this seminar, Dr. Remco van de Pas will unpack the planetary health paradigm.

Blog on the Care Economy and reflection of the Beyond growth conference in the European Parliament Featured article International Health Policies newsletter: https://www.internationalhealthpolicies.org/featured-article/care-is-the-beating-heart-of-an-economy-moving-beyond-growth/

The author argues that policymakers and development actors hail German-African Cooperation in Global Health as a success in effective multilateralism and cooperation for the public good, but questions whether it is also mutually beneficial and reciprocal. Short analysis for Africa Policy Research Institute: https://afripoli.org/german-african-h...

In a global context, the pernicious effects of colonialism and coloniality are increasingly being recognised in many sectors. As a result, calls to reverse colonial aphasia and amnesia, and decolonise, are getting stronger. This raises a number of questions, particularly for entities that acted as agents of (previous) colonising countries and worke...

Die gegenwärtige internationale Gesundheitszusammenarbeit fokussiert sich auf den Ausbau biomedizinischer Technologien wie Impfstoffe, Arzneimittel und Diagnostika, während sie die sozio-ökologischen Determinanten der Gesundheit vernachlässigt und ihnen sogar schadet. Handelspolitische Maßnahmen führen dazu, dass Ländern des Globalen Südens Gesundh...

Climate deterioration, pandemic, and war: the world is currently facing multiple crises, the management of which challenge societies worldwide and threaten to overwhelm international politics. Each crisis in itself and in their interaction worsen determinants of health, such as food security, social and economic development, equitable access to hea...

This working paper traces the development and impact of larger philanthropic actors an its funding on global and planetary health policy. It make the cases that these enhance multi-stakeholder and partnerships approaches, erode democratic multilateralism and global health governance, skew research and data to pre-set indicators and eventually under...

Introduction Rural pipeline approach has recently gain prominent recognition in improving the availability of health workers in hard-to-reach areas such as rural and poor regions. Understanding implications for its successful implementation is important to guide health policy and decision-makers in Sub-Saharan Africa. This review aims to synthesize...

Background The COVID-19 outbreak has shifted the course in the global health debate further towards health security and biomedical issues. Even though global health had already played a growing role in the international policy agenda, the pandemic strongly reinforced the interest of the media, the general public and the community in cross-border in...

A reflection on the capitalist and colonial academic publishing ‘machine’ that we have entrusted to make knowledge available to the world. Written for the Collective on the Political Determinants of Global Health after a dialogue between members in October 2022: https://www.sum.uio.no/english/research/networks/the-collective-for-the-political-deter...

This think piece explains why many health systems in Europe are intrinsically unsustainable. This phenomenon is known as ‘uneconomic growth’, it occurs when increases in production come at the expense of resources and well-being that is worth more than the items made. In health care this becomes visible as the social and environmental costs of expa...

In October 2022, the first-ever Dutch Global Health Strategy (DGHS) was released. Developed jointly by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) and Ministry of Health (MoH), the strategy will be implemented by both ministries and in cooperation with others. While we welcome this collaborative integrated government approach, which we have long argued f...

Presentation for Think Tank 30, the youth Think Tank of the Club of Rome, Germany https://thinktank30.de/ . Presentation is on the potential coloniality, inequities and securitisation related to One Health Policies and policy alternatives, including Postgrowth economic policies, in overcoming then.

Het is belangrijk dat overheid en samenleving voorbereid zijn op verschillende toekomstscenario’s voor het verloop van de Covid-19-pandemie. Om hierbij te helpen, werkten veertien adviescolleges vijf coronascenario's verder uit: (1) Verkoudheid (2) Griep+ (3) Externe dreiging (4) Continue strijd en (5) Worst case. Regering, parlement en samenlevin...

The authors of the Integrated ScienceIntegrated science:MultidisciplinarityMultidisciplinarityandInterdisciplinarityInterdisciplinarityinHealthHealth were asked how you would see the future of your field 30 years later. This chapter presents the authors’ views on this subject in 2050. The Al-Samah danceDance. In the above poem, Hushang Ebtehaj says...

Access to relevant and affordable health servicesHealth services is a significant component of social protectionSocial protection, in particular, through universal health coverage (UHC)Universal health coverage (UHC). Despite the existing progress, achieving UHC is stalled or not on the right track. WorldwideWorldwide, over 50% of people live witho...

Over decades has capitalist economic growth widened health inequities globally. It Is also the main driver of the multiple ecological, pandemic, food and social crises communities face today . Growthism, and is expansionary, appropriating, colonial, violent nature is at the core of these multiple crises. An alternative paradigm needs to be imagined...

Universal Health Coverage (UHC) has become one of the major health strategies pursued by countries and global health actors. UHC policy and its discourse are driven by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank (WB) and have become embedded in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The genesis of UHC was discussed in Global Health Wa...

Universal health coverage, as one of the targets of the Sustainable Development Goals, is the access to key promotive, preventive, curative and rehabilitative health interventions for all at an affordable cost. It is a practical expression of the concern for health equity and the right to health, and a goal for all countries. This review is a novel...

Opinion article on why planetary health science and thinking should include considerations on limiting biomedical solutions and economic growth imperatives for the necessary and urgent transitions required to enable the safe space of the life essentials and needs that people require, while respecting the planetary boundaries within which life can t...

Background The pandemic of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a timely reminder of the nature and impact of Public Health Emergencies of International Concern. As of 12 January 2022, there were over 314 million cases and over 5.5 million deaths notified since the start of the pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic takes variable shapes and forms, in t...

Reflections on proceedings and outcome of the conference Climate Justice and Health Equity by Be-Cause Health the Belgian Platform for International Health, 23-24 November 2021, Antwerp Belgium https://www.be-causehealth.be/en/bch-events/save-the-date-annual-conference-climate-emergency-and-health-2/ Published in "Artsenkrant": https://www.arts...

After almost two years of battling an unprecedented health emergency, the world continues to be confronted with new waves of the COVID-19 pandemic and the global South finds itself in the grip of a new form of systemic inequality enshrined in the patently flawed vaccine distribution strategy. At an upcoming Special Session of the World Health Assem...

The Covid-19 pandemic prompted a strong re-engagement in global health. Because the pandemic coincided with geopolitical rifts between the US and China, but required a global response, the EU and its member states took responsibility to safeguard the World Health Organization (WHO) and initiated global arrangements for vaccine sharing for developin...

Introduction: The global COVID-19 vaccine rollout has highlighted inequities in the accessibility of countries to COVID-19 vaccines. Populations in low- and middle-income countries have found it difficult to have access to COVID-19 vaccines. Areas covered: This perspective provides analyses on historical and contemporary policy trends of vaccine d...

This report is the result of a two-year exploration of the post-growth movement, merging planetary health thinking, feminist economics and fieldwork from Dutch healthcare and caring commoning practices. In our new publication, we show that the ideology of ‘growth as good’ – and the growth-focused system it upholds – is the lead cause of rising in...

Deze synthese van de literatuur geeft de nieuwste inzichten in de impact van klimaatverandering op de gezondheid in Nederland. Vijf afzonderlijke gezondheidseffecten zijn relevant voor de Nederlandse context. Klimaatverandering gaat gepaard met een verhoogde frequentie, intensiteit en duur van hittegolven. De belangrijke hittegerelateerde gezondhei...

This synthesis provides the latest insights into the impact of climate change in the Netherlands for which five separate health effects are particularly relevant. Climate change is associated with increased frequency, intensity and duration of heat waves. Major heat-related health risks include heat stroke, exacerbations of renal dysfunction due to...

Buyer’s clubs were first recognised during the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the 1980s and focussed on knowledge curation and distribution of treatments. In the past decade, there has been a resurgence of buyer’s clubs, mostly focussed on hepatitis C treatment and PrEP. This paper aims to increase understanding of buyer’s clubs and stimulate discussion on t...

The German Government has put its weight behind the proposal of Charles Michel of the EU Council, the Director General of the World Health Organization Dr. Tedros and 20 more heads of states from around the world to discuss and negotiate an international pandemic treaty, or more precisely, a Framework Convention for Pandemic Preparedness and Respon...

Retention of healthcare workers in rural areas in the post-Ebola context in Guinea

This independent review report was commissioned by WHO in November 2020, and conducted by the Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp (Remco van de Pas, Linda Mans, Percy Mahlathi, and Delphin Kolie). It is aimed at Member States, development partners, key stakeholders, international financing institutions, and all other constituencies with a broad...

►Sociologist Abram de Swaan wrote in the 1990s about a ‘Project for a Beneficial Epidemic’. ►Could the COVID-19 pandemic prod ‘concerted action by the wealthy countries to eradicate the conditions of poverty that caused the spread of a disease on a world scale?’ ► COVID-19 seems likely to become an endemic, and governments will need to switch from...

The International Academic Forum (IAFOR) was commissioned by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) to conduct this international study on the prevention and responses to the outbreak of infectious diseases on international cruise ships, and how the system of international cooperation and coordination (including areas of international law)...

In this short paper we discuss COVID-related societal challenges and options for stepping up transatlantic cooperation in the field of global health. We look specifically at societal implications, global health governance and the implications of vaccine nationalism. This article is part of a series of papers that resulted in the report: First Res...

Background Global health security (GHS) and universal health coverage (UHC) are key global health agendas which aspire for a healthier and safer world. However, there are tensions between GHS and UHC strategy and implementation. The objective of this study was to assess the relationship between GHS and UHC using two recent quantitative indices. Me...

SWP-Aktuell 2020/A 105, Dezember 2020, 8 Seiten. https://www.swp-berlin.org/publikation/unterstuetzung-fuer-die-weltgesundheitsorganisation/ Vor der Covid-19-Pandemie galt die Europäische Union (EU) weder als Motor für globale Gesundheit noch als bedeutende Unterstützerin der Weltgesundheits-organisation (WHO). 2010 verabschiedete der Rat der EU...

HACIA UNA UNIÓN EUROPEA DE LA SALUD EN MEDIO DE LA PANDEMIA COVID-19 en La salud en la cooperación al desarrollo y la acción humanitaria. Informe 2020, medicusmundi y Médicos del Mundo. p104-106

Friedrich-Ebert-Stifting Perspective https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/16919.pdf Global skills partnerships (GSPs) can contribute to global health workforce development, if they balance the interests of source countries, destination countries and migrant health workers. Most GSPs are concerned with short-term return on investment in the desti...

The Covid-19 pandemic marks a shift in the EU’s approach to the multilateral system. Just at a time when the EU aspires to avoid being crushed between the US and China, the World Health Organization (WHO) became one of the new battlegrounds in world politics. This norm-setting international organization for health was already under pressure due to...

The COVID-19 crisis has prompted the European Union (EU) to rethink its health policy, or rather those of its policies that influence the health policies of member states, as those largely comprise a national competence, and sometimes a subnational one. During the pandemic, EU institutions and EU member states identified issues where more EU coordi...

The variation in the speed and intensity of SARS-CoV-2 transmission and severity of the resulting COVID-19 disease are still imperfectly understood. We postulate a dose-response relationship in COVID-19, and that “the dose of virus in the initial inoculum” is an important missing link in understanding several incompletely explained observations in...

SWP & Clingendael Comment Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the European Union (EU) was neither a strong pro-moter of global health nor a strong supporter of the World Health Organization (WHO). The Global Health Council Conclusions from 2010 were never comprehensively implemented and quickly forgotten. With the pandemic greatly affecting EU member s...

Over the last few decades, the global health workforce (HWF) gap has increased. This gap concerns the skilled HWF required for providing essential health care services across the world in an equitable manner. This thesis takes a cosmopolitan outlook, as coined by Ulrich Beck to describe a reflexive modernity, to study what is required to develop th...

PhD defense to be viewed via https://youtu.be/zIXEikahqBo

The free movement of people is a cornerstone of an open and integrated Europe. Yet the labor migration of Europeans from lower-income countries in southern and eastern Europe to higher-income countries in northern and western Europe has had significant impact on the workforce— including the loss of skilled health professionals in their most product...

OPINION: Covid-19 and the Trojan horse that eroded the World Health Organization MT Bulletin of the Netherlands Society for Tropical Medicine and International Health. No. 2 August 2020. Volume 58. ISSN 0166-9303. p17-18. https://www.nvtg.org/uploads/MTb-PDF/2020_MT_Covid-19.pdf

It is very exceptional that a new disease becomes a true pandemic. Since its emergence in Wuhan, China, in late 2019, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes COVID-19, has spread to nearly all countries of the world in only a few months. However, in different countries, the COVID-19 epidemic takes variabl...

Presentation on the possibilities and limitations of health labor market analyses in relation to health workforce migration.

Whereas the heart of the purpose and activity of the European Union is concerned with economic harmonisation, its internal market, and the freedom of movement of people, goods, services, and capital, necessarily require public health measures. The EU is committed to both human rights and to “Health in All Policies”. This paper considers how that ag...

Article, in German, on the Globalization Paradox and the Coronavirus Pandemic for the magazine of the International Physicians for the Prevention against Nuclear War; IPPNW Forum. https://issuu.com/ippnw/docs/forum_162

The global scale of the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic and its response is unprecedented. This Clingendael Report applies Dani Rodrik’s framework of Globalization’s political trilemma to analyze the current response to the pandemic. In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis he argued that any recovery measures would have to balance off state p...

The Coronavirus pandemic and the irrelevance of the SDGs. Time for a Jubilee. Ghent centre for Global Studies. Part of the blog series "Debating the SDG's. https://www.globalstudies.ugent.be/blog-series-debating-the-sdgs/ https://www.globalstudies.ugent.be/the-coronavirus-pandemic-and-the-irrelevance-of-the-sdgs/2/ SDG3 on health and wellbeing...

Corona underpins the importance of global health arrangements. Opinion article published via Clingendael, Netherlands Institute of International Relations. https://www.clingendael.org/publication/corona-underpins-importance-global-health-arrangements

Rapid and potentially irreversible climate change poses a direct threat to global public health. Andrew Harmer and colleagues argue that WHO should recognise this in the same way as global threats from specific diseases

Responding to the coronavirus outbreak. Security for whom? Security from what? Opinion article for Clingendael, Netherlands Institute of International Relations. https://www.clingendael.org/publication/responding-coronavirus-outbreak

Introductory article on European health policy approaches for the ALMAS JOURNAL, SHIRAZ UNIVERSITY OF MEDICAL SCIENCES

Presentation on why current policy pathways to attain UHC as part of the sustainable development agenda will not work. A different economic paradigm, moving away from its growth logic, is required to advance health for all. This follows an 'Doughnut' Economic model whereby social needs are fulfilled and planetary boundaries are respected. Present...

Results-based financing (RBF) is subject to fierce debate and the evidence-base on its cost effectiveness is scarce. To our knowledge, only one cost-effectiveness study of RBF in a lower-middle income country has been published in a peer reviewed journal. That study – in Zambia – concludes that RBF is cost-effective, which was then uncritically rep...

It is very exceptional that a new disease becomes a true pandemic. Since its emergence in Wuhan, China, in late 2019, SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has spread to nearly all countries of the world in only a few months. However, in different countries, the COVID-19 epidemic takes variable shapes and forms in how it affects communities....

Abstract Introduction Guinea is a country with a critical deficit and maldistribution of healthcare workers along with a high risk of epidemics' occurrence. However, actors in the health sector have missed opportunities for more than a decade to attract political attention. This article aims to explain why this situation exists and what were the ro...

Part of the Technical series on primary health care on the occasion of the Global Conference on Primary Health Care, Astana, Kazakhstan. October 2018. World Health Organization. (‎2018)‎. Primary health care and health emergencies. World Health Organization. https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/328105. License: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO

Background: The state of the Guinean health workforce is one of the country’s bottlenecks in advancing health outcomes. The impact of the 2014–2015 Ebola virus disease outbreak and resulting international attention has provided a policy window to invest in the workforce and reform the health system. This research constitutes a baseline study on the...

Introduction In 2007, the antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence club (AC) model was introduced to South Africa to combat some of the health system barriers to ART delivery, such as staff constraints and increasing patient load causing clinic congestion. It aimed to absorb the growing number of stable patients on treatment, ensure quality of care a...

Appendix S1: Data extraction sheet.

Discussion paper for the Stakeholder’s Dialogue on International Health Worker Migration and the Global Skills Partnerships, 9 December, Marrakesh. Morocco. A side-event of the Intergovernmental Conference to Adopt the UN Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration. Comments on this version can be sent to r.vandepas@maastrichtunivers...

Presentation analysing the concept of Global Skills Partnerships and its potential impact on Health Workforce Migration. Presented during the side -event: Health Worker Migration & Global Skills Partnerships: A Stakeholder’s Dialogue, organized by Public Services International, European Federation of Public Service Unions, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung,...

Attacks on health workers and humanitarian staff have increased over the years. Most of these occur in countries facing violent conflicts. Scholars have analyzed this as a ‘securitisation of health'. Health workers do not only provide necessary health care and facilitate stability and peace but unfortunately some also have become more closely invol...

Technical brief for The Global Conference on Primary Health Care (PHC), 25-26 October 2018, Astana, Kazachstan. Organised by WHO, Ministery of Healthcare, republic of Kazachstan and UNICEF. The technical paper explains why a PHC-approach preparing for and during emergencies is crucial for health systems functioning, Global Health Security and Unive...

Investing in a sustainable health workforce requires long-term action at country and international levels as part of an intersectoral effort. Social third sector/civil society can have an active role as change agents (see case studies 18, 19 and 20). This section showcases the approach of nine civil society organizations (CSOs) and how they have be...

BMJ Opinion- June 2018 https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2018/06/18/whither-the-who-code-in-the-scrap-the-cap-campaign/ In 2010 the UK adopted the World Health Organization’s Global Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel, an important international agreement on which the recently successful Scrap the Cap campaign is silent....

The fourth Global Forum on Human Resources (HRH) for Health was held in Ireland November 2017. Its Dublin declaration mentions that strategic investments in the health workforce could contribute to sustainable and inclusive growth and are an imperative to shared prosperity. What is remarkable about the investment frame for health workforce developm...

Key Messages: Globalisation has resulted in health services and the social determinants of health (SDHs) being influenced by transnational factors, often outside the health sector. Policy-makers must hence seek coherence and inter-sectoral governance at multiple levels – international, national, district and local. The UHC framework generates fo...

Presentation on why investing in the health workforce and health systems is crucial for Global health and human security.

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Ms. Hilal Elver, is visiting Indonesia from 9 April to 18 April 2018. The general purpose of the mission is to collect information and examine issues relevant to the right to food. The findings on the country visit are goiong to be compiled in a public report, which will be presented to th...

Key Messages: • Pooling of financial resources and health risks is critical to the UHC aspirations in Uganda. However, it is constrained by fragmentation and high levels of out-of-pocket payments. • There is need to improve prepayment mechanisms by leveraging the already existing pools, such as government funding, donor aid, Community-Based Health...

Analysis on European global health policy framework, implementation and discourses; alternative approach to include circular economy objectives as underlying principle; implications for Global health policy and governance, possible policy pathways; political challenges and momentum.

Lunch session lecture provided at Royal Tropical Institute (KIT) Amsterdam during a course on HRH governance. It addresses the following topics: 1. Why countries cooperate on health 2.Health workforce labor mobility 3. Fiscal space and policy coherence 4. Global health policy and workforce governance

A number of authors advocate for a radical, innovative shift in global health governance, as complex global health challenges cannot be longer be borne by WHO alone.Network governance emerged as a leading institutional design to guide 21st century global health governance. We argue WHO needs to take up the role of meta-governor, for which it shoul...

Presentation analysing trends in and current financial situation of the World Health Organization and its new 13th Global Programme of Work (2020 -2025) and broadening the scope to the financing of development objectives and UN institutions. The presentation argues for new public financing mechanisms for Global Public Goods for Health. These mechan...

The International Health Partnership UHC 2030 Working Group on Support to Countries with a Fragile or Challenging Operational Environments aims to develop guidance for improved aid coordination and health systems strengthening in fragile settings. This led to the following review question: “What does existing peer- reviewed and selected grey litera...

Study on health workforce policy developments post -Ebola epidemic in Guinea. Baseline study for a five-year Belgian funded program on scientific intstitutional capacity strenghtening for health systems and policy research. Study analysis health workforce trends, policy implementation and health systems impact as a baseline before health workforce...

Background: This article assesses the global health policies of the European Union (EU) and those of its individual member states. So far EU and public health scholars have paid little heed to this, despite the large budgets involved in this area. While the European Commission has attempted to define the 'EU role in Global Health' in 2010, member...

We conducted a follow-up analysis of the implementation of the Human Resources for Health (HRH) commitments made by country governments and other actors at the Third Global Forum on HRH in 2013. Since then member states of the WHO endorsed Universal Health Coverage as the main policy objective whereby health systems strengthening, including reinfor...