Committing to strengthen the global health architecture, the New Delhi Declaration of G20 countries said it would focus on improving essential health services and health systems to better than pre-pandemic levels within the next 2-3 years.
The G20 leaders said they would prioritise tackling antimicrobial resistance (AMR) following the 'One Health' approach, including through research and development, infection prevention and control. This comes even as experts have warned that antimicrobial resistance would will be one of the biggest, man-made pandemics in the future.
'One Health', an appraoch advocated several times by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is an integrated, unifying approach that aims to balance and optimise the health of people, animals and ecosystems, as per the WHO.
"We will continue progress towards polio eradication and ending ongoing epidemics including AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, hepatitis and water-borne and other communicable diseases, also recognising the importance of research on long Covid," the declaration said.
The G20 leaders said they were committed to building more resilient, equitable, sustainable, and inclusive health systems to achieve Universal Health Coverage, enhance pandemic preparedness and strengthen existing infectious diseases surveillance systems.
The adoption of the New Delhi declaration was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the G20 Leaders' Summit on Saturday.
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As developed countries came in for criticism for hoarding vaccines at the peak of the Covid pandemic, in what came to be known as "vaccine nationalism", the G20 leaders committed to facilitate equitable access to safe, effective, quality-assured, and affordable
vaccines and other medical countermeasures especially in low-and middle-income countries.
"We will enhance the resilience of health systems and support development of climateresilient and low-carbon health systems in collaboration with multilateral development banks (MDBs), and support the work of the WHO-led Alliance for Transformative Action on Climate and Health (ATACH)," the declaration said.
The G20 leaders also committed to recognise the potential role of evidence-based traditional and complementary medicine in health and take note of international efforts in this direction.
The leaders also called for promoting and improving access to mental health services and psychosocial support in an inclusive manner.
The G20 member nations also committed to strong international counter-narcotics cooperation, including information sharing and capacity building to disrupt production and proliferation of illicit drugs.
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