April 23, 2009 | Read Time: 2 minutes
Grant makers, philanthropists, and donor advisers began the second day of the Global Philanthropy Forum with a discussion on how to expand access to health care around the world. But first they heard from Nancy-Ann DeParle, director of the White House Office for Health Reform, about America’s health-care challenges.
Ms. DeParle described how, even in a country as wealthy as the United States, roughly 47 million people lack health insurance. She called on philanthropy to share its ideas, including those culled from abroad, with the federal government as it seeks to expand health-care coverage.
“Some of the most innovative ideas have come from you, your research, you studies, and your models,” she said.
Ms. DeParle pointed to Mexico as an example of a country that had worked successfully to improve its health-care system.
Speaking at the Washington event, Julio Frenk, Mexico’s former minister of health, said people need to push their governments to recognize the economic and security arguments in favor of improving health care coverage for all.
“We have to make the case with the ministers of finance, the presidents, that health is necessary in achieving economic growth,” he said. “We’ll never have successful education policies without healthy children and healthy teachers.”
Melanne Verveer, the U.S. State Department’s ambassador at large for global women’s issues, urged donors to focus on improving women’s health, which she said had an enormous influence on economic growth.
“When a mother dies or is severely ill, her family suffers dramatically, her children are more likely to be stunted, to be deprived of education and the kind of health care they’re required,” she said.
Ms. Verveer and others emphasized that changes to health care can’t happen without political will — and that a vocal nonprofit world is vital to keeping pressure on government to get things done.
“To make the top more effective,” she said, “we need pressure from the bottom.”
