In a BMJ analysis, Ilona Kickbusch of the Graduate Institute of International Studies’ Global Health Program, outlines four ways in which foreign policy and health can interact. “Foreign policy can endanger health when diplomacy breaks down or when trade considerations trump health; health can be used as an instrument of foreign policy in order to achieve other goals; health can be an integral part of foreign policy; and foreign policy can be used to promote health goals. These approaches cannot always be sharply differentiated and are better visualised as a continuum,” she writes (6/10).