Protectionism will not protect

GLOBAL HEALTH

- WINNIE BYANYIMA MICHAEL MARMOT

As many Global North countries turn inwards, foreign assistance has become an easy target.

The decimation of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has dominated headlines, but the United Kingdom and many European countries have also cut their foreign-aid budgets. Policymakers in these countries view this spending as a form of charity and think that bolstering their economic and military might can deliver more benefits for more people.

This instinct is short-sighted. It recalls the great-power ambitions of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that culminated in two devastating world wars.

The global governance architecture that emerged from this unprecedented tragedy initially focused on responding to reconstruction needs and humanitarian crises, before turning to development. Despite its flaws, this approach helped lift more than one billion people out of extreme poverty and build stable and thriving economies around the world.

The global health system is a case in point. Built with funding from the United States, the United Kingdom and other wealthy countries, it has substantially reduced infectious disease rates and health inequalities, creating a safer and more secure world. Five years ago, this system was instrumental in detecting Covid-19, tracking its spread and mobilising a global response.

But Covid-19 also illustrated how poorer countries and households are caught in an inequality-pandemic cycle. After compiling and analysing hundreds of peer-reviewed studies, the Global Council on Inequality, Aids and Pandemics (of which we are members) found that poor and marginalised people struggle to access health services during disease outbreaks, leaving them more susceptible to infection, illness and death.