On March 24th Transform Health and the G20 India Health Secretariat, invited UNITE to join a virtual multi-stakeholder consultation to provide input into the Global Initiative on Digital Health (proposed by the G20).

This is applicable not just to G20 countries but to all, and focused on questions around the scope of the initiative and what should be included, how it should be governed, membership and who should be involved, funding, monitoring and accountability and other considerations for the G20.

Hon. Gisela Scaglia attended the consultation meeting and shared her views on the need for digital health legislation in Latin America.

 

“We should create independent National Digital Health Agencies in order for digital health programmes to continue despite political transitions and change in leadership.”

 

– Hon. Gisela Scaglia, UNITE’s Chapter Chair for Latin America and the Caribbean

Transform Health is conducting a short survey till the 31st of March to record the inputs of all stakeholders for this initiative.

Digital health offers a huge opportunity to accelerate progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goal of reaching Universal Health Coverage (UHC) by 2030. The equitable, inclusive and sustainable digital transformation of health systems can help scale up access to primary health care services, strengthen resilient health systems, close equity gaps to deliver health for all.

Despite progress, many countries are not on track to achieve their UHC targets by 2030. The High-Level Meeting on UHC, the 76th World Health Assembly in May, this year’s G20, are key milestone moments to help stimulate needed commitments and action.

In light of this, Transform Health is calling for digital health and health data governance to be prioritised as key accelerators for UHC to be achieved by 2030, with a policy brief containing  8 key asks for this critical year of action.