Commercial Determinants of Health: What are they? Why do they matter? What can we do?

The World Health Organization is inviting you to the first webinar of the Commercial Determinants of Health Webinar Series. This introductory webinar will introduce the commercial determinants of health, explain why they matter for public health, and global health equity, and provide an introduction to action, which will then be explored further in the subsequent webinars. 

Agenda

Welcome and introductions:

• Naoko Yamamoto, Assistant Director-General, Universal Health Coverage / Healthier Populations, WHO
• Etienne Krug, Director, Social Determinants of Health, WHO

Keynote presentation:

• Nick Freudenberg, Distinguished Professor of Public Health, City University of New York, United States

High level roundtable invited speakers:

• James Hospedales, Special Advisor for the Healthy Caribbean Coalition; Founder and Director of EarthMedic/EarthNurse; past Director, Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA)
• Alan Donnelly, Executive Chairman Sovereign Sustainability and Development; Patron of the G20 Health and Development Partnership; former Member of the European Parliament (MEP) and leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party
• Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics, University of Massachusetts, USA; member of the WHO Council on the Economics of Health For All; member of the UN High-Level Advisory Board on Economic and Social Affairs
• Vesna-Kerstin Petric, Director-General, Public Health Directorate, Ministry of Health, Slovenia; Member of the Executive Board, WHO
• Nasruddin Djoko Surjono PhD, Head of Jakarta Development Planning Bureau
• Douglas Webb, Manager, Health and Innovating Financing HIV, Health and Development Group, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

Webinar Chair and Moderator:

• Fran Baum, Professor, Matthew Flinders Distinguished Professor of Public Health; Foundation Director of the Southgate Institute for Health, Society and Equity, Flinders University, Australia

Conclusions and close:

• Monika Kosinska , Head, Economic and Commercial Determinants, WHO
• Etienne Krug, Director, Social Determinants of Health, WHO

Why 

One of the key priorities identified for WHO is the need to raise awareness and understanding of the commercial determinants of health, their impact, and effective action for policymakers to address them. Therefore, WHO is launching a series of webinars for a diverse audience that will explore the evidence base for commercial determinants of health, how they manifest in practice, and potential actions at different levels and by different actors.

Participants 

WHO encourages the participation of a diverse global audience including public-interest civil society organizations, academic experts and students, donors and philanthropic partners, policymakers at a national and local level, WHO staff across levels, regions and programmes and UN agencies.

Further information

Please see the WHO Factsheet on Commercial Determinants of Health or contact the WHO Secretariat at cdoh@who.int for further information.

Upcoming webinars under the same series