Healthy Reflections on Final Day at Davos – Olivier Raynaud

Olivier Raynaud is Guest Blogging for the Forum. He is the Senior Director, Global Health and Healthcare Sector, World Economic Forum

The final day of health sessions began with a stimulating high level CEO-only discussion on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) to develop a plan to highlight the role of the private sector in the prevention and treatment of NCDs, especially with the UN high level meeting on NCDs rapidly approaching in September 2011. Margaret Chan, Director General of the World Health Organisation, stressed the importance of multisectoral collaboration within and beyond governments, as it is imperative to have synergy if we want positive and constructive action.

The workplace was also highlighted as an important place to start tackling this problem as companies all have the common ground of being employers and can therefore actively participate in the Workplace Wellness Alliance, an initiative developed by the Forum.
 
We must not forget that the fight to combat chronic diseases is not just about the lead-up to the UN high level meeting but will be a long journey that needs to be spurred by clear goals and shared objectives.

The health agenda at Davos closed with an interactive ideas lab session on improving healthcare delivery which generated discussion around the Partnership for Innovative Healthcare Delivery, catalyzed by the World Economic Forum at Davos. The partnership addresses specific challenges that innovators face in the delivery of care arena, and the purpose of the ideas lab was to encourage brainstorming around these challenges. Victor Dzau (Chief Executive Officer of Duke University Medical Center), Francis Collins (Director, National Institutes of Health), Khawar Mann (Head of Healthcare at Apax Partners) and James Gregory Dees (Professor, Practice of Social Entrepreneurship, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University) gave fantastic and highly stimulating presentation, followed by intense interaction with participants ; this generated several interesting suggestions : innovation is critically needed for delivery of prevention, including secondary prevention for NCD ;  the partnership could help social entrepreneurs work better with each other, be motivated to join so their innovation scales and has more impact ; and suggestion was made to focus on India, and simultaneously UK to help reverse-innovation.

Overall, participants seem happy to see Health high on our Davos agenda this year ! Health sessions generated a lot of interest and we are looking forward to keeping the positive momentum and having more insightful discussions both at the upcoming World Economic Forum regional summits and other milestones such as the UN high level meeting. 

But this is only the beginning, so stay tuned and visit us on http://www.weforum.org/health!

A bientôt,

Olivier