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July 06, 2005
The People's Health Assembly, Cuenca Ecuador
For starters...
This blog will be a record, a scattering of thoughts and impressions, from the People's Health Assembly, a gathering of activists from around the world in Cuenca, Ecuador, high in the Andes, between July 15 and July 23, 2005.
I've been to Ecuador twice before. My first visit, in 2000, combined several goals -- a research trip to visit community development projects on the Pacific Coast devastated by El Nino, a stay with a kichwa/shuar indigenous community in the Amazon -- called Amazanga -- to record some of their story and help them buy up land that once belonged to them, and an attempt to build a relationship with the radical environmental human rights group Accion Ecologica, for further research into the health impacts of oil drilling in the Amazon.
My second visit, in 2001, involved working with Accion Ecologica on a study of the health impacts of oil from Lago Agrio near the Colombian border south across the Rio Cononaca, deep into the jungle. It was one of the most miserably depressing experiences I've ever had. We interviewed hundreds of people living in the area -- about a third of whom were cancer victims, took photos and videos, and laid the groundwork for a study which was published by Accion Ecologica two years later.
An article I wrote about this visit can be found here: http://www.newtopiamagazine.net/archives/content/issue17/features/ecuador.php
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So, somewhat familiar with the terrain in Ecuador -- though that terrain is always shifting in the country's perpetual economic and social crisis -- I'll be landing there for a whirlwind week, attending the People's Health Assembly. There, I will present on a few panels about environmental health and justice, I will collect audio footage for a radio show on oil, and I will listen to the testimonies of people from around the world who are working to change the deteriorating conditions of health everywhere...
For an introduction to the People's Health Movement and the People's Health Assembly, read on....
How it all started
In the beginning, there were thousands of people across the world working very hard in big and little ways to promote the dream of a world where a healthy life is a reality for all. In the optimistic, joyous, compassionate 1970’s it seemed that this would be possible. And was not the Alma Ata Declaration signed by 134 governments in 1978? Did not the declaration promise Health For All by 2000? When the millennium edged closer and equitable health policy was still nowhere the optimists did not give up. They knew that the Third World had been plunged into debt and health care was in danger of complete privatization. To remind the world of the commitment made in more hopeful times the optimists came together in solidarity.
When the optimists met
People's organizations, civil society organizations, NGOs, social activists, health professionals, academics and researchers came together to make a strong statement against the studied indifference in this crucial area of human life. The First People's Health Assembly was organized in Savar, Bangladesh in December 2000 to discuss the Health for All Challenge. The 5 day meet led to sharing of experiences from across the globe.
The assembly in a single voice condemned the international institutions, multinational corporations and governments which are willingly pursuing anti-people policies. The multi-national corporations who push for policies which put profits before people and the proponents of liberalisation who recommend that governments should cut expenditure on social sector like health and education came in for scathing criticism. In all 1453 participants from 75 countries came together to create and endorse a consensus document called the People's Charter for Health. The charter reflects the vision, goals, principles and calls for action that unite all the members of the PHM coalition It is most widely endorsed consensus document on health since the Alma Ata Declaration
The Movement: From Savar to Cuenca
The participants of the assembly took strength from each other and reiterated their goal to seek more compassionate and equitable health policy. The time for lonely battles was over because the threats were global and it was only a question of who went under first. Since Savar, the People’s Health Assembly knit into a movement of over 80 nations across the world, sharing energy, knowledge and resources. Affirming the goals of that first meeting, the Second People’s Health Assembly will meet in July 2005 in Cuenca, Ecuador.
The Process
The Assembly will be the result of a process of local and national reflection, discussion, debate and exchange of experiences of communities and networks as well as conferences and workshops about the aspects that influence the health and well being of everyone. And the optimists will ask the voices of the earth to demand “Health for All Now!”
The Right to Water and Healthy Sanitation
Among other topics, a focus of my work at the People's Health Assembly will be on sharing eudcational materials on basic issues of water and sanitation that I have co-created at the Hesperian Foundation. As part of ongoing work to produce A Community Guide to Environmental Health, two booklets, one on water security and one on healthy sanitation options -- both focused on communities in the developing world -- have recently been completed in collaboration with the United Nations Developement Program, and I will present them with many of our grassroots partners in Cuenca.
The booklet on water is not on the web yet, sad to say, but the booklet on sanitation -- and who doesn't love sanitation? -- is here: http://www.hesperian.org/pdf_files/Sanitation.pdf
Perhaps more politically thrilling than ecological toilets is the not-unrelated issue of water, and the ongoing struggle for a human right to water. As part of my work with Hesperian and the People's Health Movement, I have helped to draft and publicize a statement demanding that the UN pass a convention declaring safe, sufficient water to be a basic human right.
In Cuenca I'll meet with groups working internationally to promote this right, and those at the forefront of the struggles in Bolivia, Mexico, Canada and elsewhere. As most of us know by now, the struggle to maintain our right to water as a common good is one of the burning issues of the current moment....
The statement demanding a human right to water is here: http://www.righttowater.net
Posted by jeff at July 6, 2005 04:32 PM
Comments
Hi,
I am the web-editor of the PHA2 site. If you dont mind I would like to post a link to your wonderful blog on the official website. Would that be ok?
really enjoyed your blog
nisha susan
Posted by: nisha at July 21, 2005 07:39 AM