30 November 2022
The European Commission has adopted a new EU Global Health Strategy which aims at improving global health security and defining the role and responsibility of the EU in tackling key global challenges and health inequalities. The strategy positions global health as an essential pillar of EU external policy and as an external dimension of the European Health Union. It puts forward three interrelated priorities:
- Delivering better health and well-being of people across the life course
- Strengthening health systems and advancing universal health coverage
- Preventing and combatting health threats, including pandemics, applying a One Health approach.
The Strategy supports the universal health-related targets in the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. It will focus on achieving universal health coverage, strengthening primary health care, and tackling the root causes of ill-health like poverty and social inequalities. The strategy also stresses the importance of addressing important drivers of ill health including climate change and environmental degradation, food security. The Strategy introduces a robust “health-in-all-policies” approach to ensure that a wide variety of policies genuinely contribute to health goals. It identifies three key enablers for better health: digitalisation, research, and a skilled labour force with concrete actions to advance globally in these areas.