Framework convention on global health needed

In this week's PLoS Medicine, Lawrence Gostin from Georgetown University, Washington DC, and colleagues argue that a global health agreement—such as a Framework Convention on Global Health—is needed and would inform post-Millennium Development Goal (MDG) global health commitments.

The authors discuss their work on the Joint Action and Learning Initiative on National and Global Responsibilities for Health (JALI), a coalition of civil society organizations and academics that seeks to clarify the health services to which everyone is entitled under the human right to health, the national and global responsibilities for securing this right, and global governance structures that can realize these responsibilities and close major health inequities.

The authors say that "mutual benefits to countries in the global South and North would come from a global health agreement that defines national and global health responsibilities, and that the JALI aims to "respond to growing demands for accountability, and to create the political space that could make a global health agreement possible".