In February, UNDP, WHO, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria (Global Fund) convened preliminary discussions to establish a global network on anti-corruption, transparency, and accountability in health systems. 

It is estimated that US$455 billion is lost on average each year to health care fraud and corruption globally, impeding progress not only in health, but also across numerous Sustainable Development Goals.[1]

The conference set out to acknowledge the issue of corruption, to map current responses of policymakers, practitioners, and researchers, and to collectively plan to improve our global response:

“What is common to all forms of corruption in the health sector is that they waste precious time and money, negatively impacting the standards of care, access, and equity,” Mandeep Dhaliwal, Director of HIV, Health and Development Group, UNDP, explained.

More than 130 participants from health and anti-corruption communities, including government, academia, civil society, private sector, and development agencies, launched discussions that tackled issues including coordination, definitions of corruption, sharing evidence and community participation.

 “The most effective approaches in dealing with anti-corruption and transparency are approaches that focus on people, involve the community, and ensure that government agencies…are informed of their responsibilities and are fully resourced to carry out their work, said Allen Maleche, Executive Director, Kenya Legal and Ethical Issues Network on HIV and AIDS (KELIN).

“Having a forum that brings development partners, civil society, and donors together is extremely important because people get to hear different perspectives,” he continued. 

From methodologies that successfully mitigated risks of corruption in health systems in Tunisia and Morocco, to the use of digital technologies transforming the transparency of health system procurement services in Ukraine, success stories shared from all over the world underscored a critical point: ensuring the lessons and evidence available reaches those who can apply it, through policy reforms and interventions, is critical.

 “[Through experience exchange], we get to know what is happening in other countries [so that] when we go back to our countries, we do not have to re-live the same problems,” explained Mildred Chiri, Auditor General of Zimbabwe.

The first meeting to shape a new global network on corruption in health systems revealed the commitment of agencies and partners to no longer work in silo, stressing that transformative change through better coordination and innovative partnerships is not only possible, but imperative. The conversation will continue.

“The next step is to actually achieve consensus for what we need to do and what we need to stop doing. This means that people must work together and to go outside their comfort zones…to see what the barriers are to the change we want to achieve and how we get around them,” said Pesh Framjee, Global Head of Non-Profits, Crowe Clark and Whitehill.

The proposed global network on anti-corruption, transparency, and accountability in the health sector is planned to formally launch in early 2020. If you are interested in contributing ideas in the lead up to the launch or subscribing to the newsletter and updates, please contact Mark DiBiase (mark.dibiase@undp.org), Aneta Wierzynska (aneta.wierzynska@theglobalfund.org), and Theadora Swift Koller (kollert@who.int).  

[1]Crossing the Global Quality Chasm: Improving Health Care Worldwide. Washington (DC): National Academies Press (US); 2018 Aug 28. 6, The Critical Health Impacts of Corruption.