High Level Panel Report of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 Development Agenda Released
At the beginning of June, the high level panel (HLP) co-chaired by Prime Minister David Cameron passed its recommendations to the UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon on the future of the global development agenda.
The report is a hugely ambitious one and has managed to target many of the most pertinent issues in development today and in the future, ranging from food security to economic development and water and sanitation to good governance. It has also crucially included a health specific goal of ensuring healthy lives.
The report has not only built on the millennium development goals (MDGs) but has also looked beyond them up to 2030. For NTDs, this is hugely important.
Great progress has been made in the areas targeted by the MDGs such as malaria and HIV/AIDs with notable successes in both. However, inevitably, those issues that were excluded from the process did suffer in terms of attention and funding, with NTDs a notable example from the health sector.
The Coalition is delighted to note that the report has called for NTDs to be included in the top-level health targets, alongside HIV and AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis. By giving NTDs this platform, we are hopeful that this will help to ensure millions of people can look forward to a future free from the burden that these diseases cause.
Looking ahead, we now await the next stage of this consultative process where the UN General Assembly will make a final decision on what the development agenda will look like beyond 2015 incorporating the sustainable development agenda. The report notes that for all the health goals, the indicators should be further disaggregated and the Coalition urges that this be done with precision, incorporating tangible targets beneath the overarching health goal.
