Global Health Solidarity

Abstract

For much of the 20th century, vulnerability to deprivations of health has often been defined by geographical and economic factors. Those in wealthy, usually ‘Northern’ and ‘Western’, parts of the world have benefited from infrastructures, and accidents of geography and climate, which insulate them from many serious threats to health. Conversely, poorer people are typically exposed to more threats to health, and have lesser access to the infrastructures needed to safeguard them against the worst consequences of such exposure. However, in recent years the increasingly globalized nature of the world’s economy, society and culture, combined with anthropogenic climate change and the evolution of antibiotic resistance, has begun to shift the boundaries that previously defined the categories of person threatened by many exogenous threats to health. In doing so, these factors expose both new and forgotten similarities between persons, and highlight the need for global cooperative responses to the existential threats posed by climate change and the evolution of antimicrobial resistance. In this article, we argue that these emerging health threats, in demonstrating the similarities that exist between even distant persons, provides a catalyst for global solidarity, which justifies, and provides motivation for, the establishment of solidaristic, cooperative global health infrastructures.

Thinking ethical and regulatory frameworks in medicine from the perspective of solidarity on both sides of the Atlantic

“…To respond to the resulting challenges, ‘localised’ ideas and approaches, such as distinctly European or Anglo-American principles, values, frameworks, etc., will likely have to be complemented by those that transcend locality, or be reframed with a view to more transnational application. Solidarity, notwithstanding its European heritage, is a concept that has a wide range of application from the local and particular to the broad and global [66]. Therefore, we believe that regulatory elements based on solidarity, such as the harm mitigation funds introduced in this article, can usefully be implemented on both sides of the Atlantic.…”

Childhood Vaccination Against Seasonal Influenza to Reduce the Overall Burden of Disease: Ethical Perspectives

“…These opportunities should be real and equal, so that people can really do and choose what they prefer to be and pursue a good life [26]. The normative demands of justice are largely compatible with the value of solidarity that normatively understood pronounces that people carry "costs" commonly to support each other and thereby assist particularly those in need [27]. Solidarity thus supports the collective action when facing common threats [28], e. g. immunization programmes against seasonal influenza that demand relatively little "costs" from everyone participating but are potentially lifesaving for particular weak members of society, like children, the elderly and otherwise chronically ill persons [9].…”

How Should Clinicians Respond to International Public Health Emergencies?

“…6 Our shared vulnerability to highly hazardous communicable diseases (HHCDs)-diseases that only know the boundaries of biology and don't respect national borders-should incite a shared responsibility to fight an HHCD outbreak together. 7 The similarity that exists between a patient at BB academic medical center and an individual living in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is that both are increasingly united in their vulnerability to emerging threats. Consider a US citizen returning from a visit to the DRC on a full plane back to the US sitting in seat 52B.…”

“…Although the United States and Europe have been successful in treating patients with known Ebola virus disease (EVD) through airlifting them and treating them in specialized biocontainment units, these are limited resources. 7 If exposures and known cases breach the limits of those resources, controlling the spread of EVD is likely to tax the US health care system and threaten the health security of the US population. The duty to care for those suffering on the other side of the globe may be strengthened by greater recognition of our shared vulnerability and a commitment to solidarity toward a shared threat.…”