PIH Featured as The Economist Calls for Universal Care
Posted on Apr 30, 2018
"As this week’s special report shows, the goal of universal basic health care is sensible, affordable and practical, even in poor countries. Without it, the potential of modern medicine will be squandered.”
So argues the cover story of the latest issue of The Economist magazine, a seven-part examination of how best to provide care for all.
PIH features prominently.
The section “An affordable necessity” begins with PIH Strategic Advisor Dr. Bailor Barrie recalling the state of Sierra Leone in 2014. In “First things first,” he reflects on PIH’s progress in improving primary health care, and in “A crazy system” he notes the shortcomings of mental health care virtually everywhere.
PIH Founders Dr. Paul Farmer and Dr. Jim Kim also appear, pushing for better, more widespread access to surgery in “Kindest cut." Not surprisingly, Rwanda’s great strides—made largely during the tenure of former Minister of Health Dr. Agnes Binagwhaho, now the Vice Chancellor of PIH’s University of Global Health Equity—are called out again and again.
It's flattering stuff, to be sure. But also, and far more importantly, inspiring. The premier English-language news magazine dug deeply into the topic of universal health care and concluded, as PIH has always believed, that a world full of hope and good health is not only the right world, but a world “within reach." We just need to keep fighting for it.
The full series can be read here.
An introductory overview can be read here.
