The health of the public: What has gone wrong?

COVID-19, a new pandemic, has swept the world. How could this have happened? In theory the world should have been prepared, armed as it has been since 2005 with a new set of International Health Regulations with universal commitment by WHO Member States. Yet disaster has struck. The authors of this paper consider that fundamental rethinking is needed, with a new review of the post-World War 2 international system for global governance for health. Whilst WHO and its present and future actions will be scrutinized, the organization is fundamentally made up of 194 Member States, which must share the responsibility for ensuring better global health protection in the future. It is clear the world needs a more effective WHO, but it also needs countries to support and develop their public health infrastructure to face today’s more complex health challenges, which can only grow in scope and complexity over coming years. The paper proposes several key steps to achieve these goals

Health and the Process of Migration

Chapter 5. Health and the Process of Migratio

The health of the public: What has gone wrong?

COVID-19, a new pandemic, has swept the world. How could this have happened? In theory the world should have been prepared, armed as it has been since 2005 with a new set of International Health Regulations with universal commitment by WHO Member States. Yet disaster has struck. The authors of this paper consider that fundamental rethinking is needed, with a new review of the post-World War 2 international system for global governance for health. Whilst WHO and its present and future actions will be scrutinized, the organization is fundamentally made up of 194 Member States, which must share the responsibility for ensuring better global health protection in the future. It is clear the world needs a more effective WHO, but it also needs countries to support and develop their public health infrastructure to face today’s more complex health challenges, which can only grow in scope and complexity over coming years. The paper proposes several key steps to achieve these goals. Conflict of interest: None declared

Bosnia and Herzegovina: assessing health systems capacity to manage large influx of refugees and migrants. Joint report on a mission of the Health Authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the WHO Regional Office for Europe.

The large numbers of refugees and migrants arriving in and transiting through Bosnia and Herzegovina pose new challenges to the health system, which must adapt and respond to the needs of both migrants and residents. This requires an efficient policy dialogue between the main stakeholders to share experiences and identify best practices. The WHO Regional Office for Europe, through the Migration and Health programme, supports Member States for strengthening the health sector's capacity to provide evidence-informed responses to the public health challenges for refugee and migrant health. In this regard, a joint assessment mission was carried out in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2019, using the WHO Toolkit to structure the assessment, interviews and site visits. This report summarizes the findings under the six functions of the WHO health system framework for strengthening a country's capacity to address public health implications of large migration flows