Egypt: Launching the Global Health Watch 2

15-16 December 2008, The Arab Scout Center, Cairo, Egypt

The PHM Global Secretariat, in collaboration with the Environment and Development Program of the Association for Health and Environmental Development (AHED), has organized a 2-days seminar on the Social and Environmental Determinants of Health in which the Global Secretariat has launched the Second Global Health Watch (GHW2) in Cairo.

The partners took the advantage to organize this seminar to discuss and apply the contents of the GHW2 rather than just launching it.

The seminar included five sessions: the first was completely dedicated to the GHW2 launch, while the four other sessions were utilized to discuss and apply the same topics of the GHW2 within the Egyptian context: An Alternative Paradigm for Development; Healthcare Systems in Egypt: Current Changes and Future Perspective; Major Social and Environmental Determinants of Health in Egypt; and Joint Action.

Around 100 participants have participated in the 2-days seminar representing the civil society organizations, academic institutions, political parties and health activists from all over Egypt

In addition the seminar witnessed a very high presence of media (newspapers, TV and radio stations).

The participants took the chance to affirm their solidarity with Dr. Mohamed Khalil, leader of the Egyptian Right to Health Campaign against the dismantling and privatization of health insurance. Because of his activism and leadership in the campaign, the Ministry of Health has taken irrationalized measures against Dr. Khalil, one of them was ending his position at the head of the cardiology department in one of the biggest health insurance hospitals in Cairo in addition to many other similar measures.