The World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, at its the seventieth session in October 2019, unanimously endorsed For the Future: Towards the Healthiest and Safest Region. In adopting that vision for WHO work in the Region, Member States agreed to focus on four thematic priorities that will have the greatest impact on future health: health security; noncommunicable diseases and ageing; the health impact of climate and environmental change; and reaching the unreached.
The data presented in this report, The Health-related Sustainable Development Goals: Progress Report of the Western Pacific Region, 2020, confirm the relevance of the thematic priorities of For the Future. This report also – as requested by the Regional Committee in 2015 and 2016 – gauges progress towards the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals and universal health coverage (UHC).
This year, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has shaken the world, posing an unprecedented challenge to health systems and societies. Much of the progress outlined in this report has served us well in confronting COVID-19, but the pandemic also has exposed fault lines in our health systems. The next several months will show whether the pandemic will force us to take a step back in our health and development ambitions, or whether we can rise to the challenge and demonstrate how health – and social and economic development – can work together to bring us to a new level.
In August 2020, the Universal Health Coverage Technical Advisory Group recognized that the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact have further demonstrated the relevance of the vision of For the Future. Member States and public health experts have reiterated their resolve to turn the “new normal” of a world living with COVID-19 into a “new better future” by making UHC a truly shared responsibility across all health domains and by grasping opportunities to transform our health systems. This report embraces that broad perspective and helps remind us that progress across all health domains hinges on a strong, future-proof health system.
This report, which presents both regional and country-specific data, also acknowledges that each of the 37 countries and areas in the Western Pacific Region is at a different stage in its journey towards UHC. WHO in the Western Pacific Region will continue to work hand in hand with all Member States in realizing their national health and development ambitions, so together we can become the healthiest and safest region.