CSR360

Posted: Wednesday 5 November 08, 11.19am GMT

This interview aims to raise awareness amongst global partners of the Commission’s valuable work and innovative agenda on health inequalities and how best to tackle them. Working towards these recommendations involves engaging the private sector to have a positive impact on all aspects of health equity – global partners are crucial to this process.

1. What was the motivation behind establishing the Commission back in 2005?

Dr Lee, the previous Director General of the WHO, asked Sir Michael Marmot to bring together a group of expert commissioners to produce a report on the social determinants of health for WHO. This was in response to an increasing recognition of the importance of this agenda, and the way in which many of the world’s health problems are interlinked, i.e. climate change, obesity and chronic diseases. It recognised the need to think about the causes of the causes. In other words, how the structure of society itself contributes to and generates more ill-health and chronic diseases.

2. What were the main challenges in conducting the research which underpins the Commission’s report?

The Commission brought together a range of knowledge networks, drawing on global best practice and expertise, and linking in key politicians, policy makers and the people’s health movement to ensure that the findings were relevant for all walks of life.

3. Which findings or recommendations did you least expect?

There had been much talk about how the report would be most relevant to lower and middle income countries, but actually it demonstrated that it had clear relevance to all countries, irrespective of income level. For example, the stark life expectancy differentials in Glasgow, one of our major cities in the UK, demonstrate its UK relevance.

4. Now that the findings have been published, what plans are in place to achieve the recommendations outlined in the Commission’s report?

This is too early to see at the moment, however, the member countries of the World Health Organisation are currently in discussions with the Regional Committees.

5. What are the most important roles that business can undertake in addressing global health inequalities?

The business sector has a key role to play in tackling inequalities. It plays a key role role in society in the way we shape our lives – from travelling to work, to what we buy to eat, how we spend our leisure time. Working with the business sector proactively to ensure that they play their full role in tackling inequalities and the way in which we shape our services will be crucial.

6. In terms of the UK’s Department of Health, how will your priorities alter as a result of the Commission’s report?

In England, we have a recent health inequalities review ‘Health Inequalities: Progress and Next Steps’. It stated that we would be asking Sir Michael Marmot to use the evidence from his Commission Report to review our own national policy. We have already stated in the Global Health Strategy how important tackling inequalities is to us.

7. What do you envisage as the next steps global partners could take in the challenge to reduce health inequalities?

Most health problems are shared globally; the causes are not unique to any one country. Business itself already operates at a global level. By uniting businesses to work on a global basis to tackle inequalities we can take a crucial next step. In these uncertain times making sure that we can work together for social good and demonstrating how this can in turn lead to economic and social prosperity will be key to our success.
The global partners network has a key role to play in this, through bringing together the key people and partners around a common goal, working with health and other organisations to tackle a very challenging agenda.

8. What advice would you give to CSR organisations trying to push the issue of health inequalities up the agenda?

A good starting point is to realise that the workplace is key to people’s health. By shaping the environment at work to support healthy eating, physical activity and promote mental health we can take a critical step towards addressing the social determinants of health. This in turn will improve business performance and productivity. I think this is a good starting point because everyone has an opportunity to gain from such activity.

For information on the work that the UK’s Department of Health and Business in the Community are doing to engage business in the agenda of global health inequalities, please visit the Programme and News pages.