PHR Student Blog

Federal funding for health is in jeopardy.

In the recent State of the Union address, President Obama announced a five-year freeze on domestic spending (aka non-security discretionary spending). On Jan. 25^th, the House of Representatives approved a resolution to reduce non-security spending to 2008 levels.

We cannot balance the budget on the backs of the most vulnerable.

To avoid losing the progress that targeted spending has made in saving lives and improving health outcomes, the Senate should pass an omnibus bill that provides slight increases to FY10 levels for the majority of global health accounts. Last year’s efforts to pass an omnibus bill died in December when it became clear that 60 votes were not available to overcome a threatened Republican filibuster, the Washington Post reported. The federal budget is currently running on a Continuing Resolution that expires March 4, 2011. If the Senate fails to sustain or increase funding, this will have a direct impact on health outcomes in 2011 and the years to come.

An arbitrary freeze on spending is short-sighted and ineffective. The money saved will not adequately address the federal deficit. For example, foreign aid is a small fraction of the US budget. The International Affairs budget makes up about 1% of the overall federal budget, yet was able to fund the treatment of AIDS, TB, and malaria for millions of people. This investment is humanitarian, diplomatic, and economically sound, as it allows people to continue working and reduces the likelihood of transmission, and hence avoids increased health care costs.

A return to 2008 levels would dramatically reduce funding for the Global Health and Child Survival USAID Account (USAID-GHCS). January marked some milestones that offer a glimpse of the urgency of the need for continued investment in global health.  This month was the one year anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti and the six month anniversary of the floods in Pakistan. Yesterday, the WHO Director General, Margaret Chan, commented that increased funding is necessary and asked,

“Will progress stall? Will powerful innovations, like the meningitis vaccine, like the vaccines for preventing diarrheal disease and pneumonia, like the new diagnostic test for tuberculosis, fall short of reaching their potential? Public health has been on a winning streak. But will we still have the resources to maintain, if not accelerate, these gains?“

Domestic health is also at risk. Most insiders anticipate a healthcare reform repeal vote in the Senate before long.

Please call your Senator to share your opinion. You can use this script:

I am a voter in your state. I urge you to sustain or expand funding for global and domestic health because it’s a smart investment. When it comes to health, short-term funding cuts will have long-term repercussions. We need to continue the work to make health care affordable and accessible, make prevention a priority, and ensure that women have access to the reproductive and other health care services they need. As a member of Physicians for Human Rights, I will be keeping an eye on how you vote on this issue.

You can find your senator here.

Please report your call here.

(After nearly ten years of dedication to PHR – first as in intern, and most recently as the Student Program Coordinator – Danielle Fox has moved on to a new position. PHR is delighted to introduce Hope O’Brien as the new Student Program Coordinator.)

As the new National Student Program Coordinator, I am honored to join the staff of Physicians for Human Rights and I look forward to working with you all.

My commitment to health as a human right began when I volunteered in Mother Teresa’s homes in Kolkata, India. Every day, I was struck by the suffering – hungry children, mentally ill women, and those needing a quiet place to die with dignity all sought sanctuary in these homes. It seemed fundamentally unjust that for some – often the poor – deprivation, injury, and disease were widely tolerated or ignored. I began to see the links between health and human rights.

A few years later, I returned to India to work with a grassroots reproductive health and rights organization. We strove to protect the right to health and to prevent the suffering that results when this right is denied. We weren’t always able to overcome the cultural or political resistance to the notion of health as a human right, and these experiences inspired me to work for a rights-based approach to health.

I have a Master of Public Administration from the University of Washington in Seattle (my home town) and in June I graduated from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) with a Master of Public Health. While there, I encountered other students who passionately believed that access to health care was a fundamental human right, and that health professionals have a special duty to protect and promote that right.

Two projects took me overseas in my year at HSPH. In one, my team worked with social entrepreneurs in a grassroots effort to provide health care in the slums of Mumbai. In the other, I worked on health workforce capacity development with the Thai Ministry of Health. Both of these experiences encouraged my conviction that every person is entitled to a right to health.

I am excited about PHR’s mission and its work at the forefront of critical human rights issues. I am even more excited by the prospect of working with you. Students are crucial to any human or civil rights movement. You inspire and sustain the movement with your courage, your conscience, and your sense of urgency. As members of PHR, and as students, you are standing alongside student activists in Iran, Burma, China, and other hotspots around the world who have taken to the streets to demand recognition of their rights. You are an ally of those who are breaking the silence, and your alliance amplifies their voices.

I look forward to getting to know each of you. We will work together to inspire other students across the nation and further the movement to advance health and human rights around the world.

Please contact me anytime.

On behalf of PHR’s National Student Advisory Board, I’d like to welcome all of you to the launch of the 2009-2010 Student Program. I’m confident that you will find the National Student Program to be a home for your passion for health and human rights! As a member of the Student Program, you benefit from having a program and peer-network dedicated solely to helping you grow and contribute as an advocate, along with the expertise of PHR’s network of internationally recognized health and human rights leaders.

As health professional students, we are uniquely poised to advocate for patients both domestically and abroad. Together we can bring our collective passion, knowledge and expertise to our classrooms, our clinics and our Congress. Having been involved with PHR for over six years, as a staff member and now as a medical student at Loyola, I can unequivocally say that this will be our most important year yet. At this moment, we have an opportunity to profoundly shape the way our present and future generations think about health and human rights. We have a phenomenal year planned, filled with opportunities to strengthen and expand your role as health and human rights advocates, as well as connect with mentors and peers all across the country.

As the academic year gets underway, the Advisory Board recommends these three simple ways to start this year strongly:

1. Get to know your fellow chapter members, both as individuals and as advocates. Many chapters are holding informal potlucks to get to know one another, discuss their goals as a chapter and develop action plans for the year.
2. Sign up for your upcoming Regional Advocacy Institute. These institutes can better your understanding of some of PHR’s priority issues, further develop your advocacy skills and foster collaboration between chapters in your region.
3. Learn about all the resources available to your chapter! The strongest chapters have a good sense of their strengths, connections, and resources. As your chapter core begins to brainstorm activity ideas, be sure to check out what resources the Student Program provides, and use this guide to assess additional resources available within your chapter, on your campus and in your community.

Finally, the Student Advisory Board members, Training Coordinators, Chapter Mentors, and, of course, Danielle, are always here to help! Don’t forget to keep in touch with us so we can offer advice and assistance for all that you are doing. Email Danielle to contact me or any of the other volunteer leaders. We are excited to support all your ideas, your creativity and your commitment to advancing health and human rights!