Announcement

Watch out for the launching of the website on "Partnership for improving access to essential medicines" to be launched soon.

About

Lack of access to essential medicines remains a serious public health problem in many countries and areas in the Western Pacific region. Access to medicines is influenced by a number of factors such as rational selection and use, pricing, patents, financing, supply and quality assurance systems. This complexity poses a great challenge for countries to overcome. The Regional Committee at its fifty-fifth session in Shanghai, China, in September 2004 endorsed the Regional Strategy for Improving Access to Essential Medicines in the Western Pacific Region 2005-2010. It requested WHO to establish a regional Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to provide technical guidance on measures to improve access to essential medicines in the Region. The group met 14-15 November 2005 in Manila, Philippines, to exchange experience, studies and practices covering relevant areas of the Regional Strategy. The meeting made a number of proposals pertaining to implementation of the regional strategy and to monitoring of the implementation

The objectives of the 1st meeting of Technical Advisory Group (TAG)

(1) to discuss the implementation plan for 2005-2010 and to monitor the implementation of the Regional Strategy in the Region for the first year 2005 and recommend appropriate measures in further improving access to essential medicines and to give advice to the Regional Director for the Western Pacific;

(2) to identify useful studies and practices advocated to the countries, especially for the areas covering medicine price, financing and supply; and

(3) to develop options for the active involvement of international partners and stakeholders in mobilizing resources and increasing advocacy for the implementation of the Strategy at country level.