Council on Foreign Relations’ “Garrett on Global Health”: Globalization and the Future of Global Public Goods
In her blog, Laurie Garrett, CFR senior fellow for global health, writes, “For many years, I have warned that what we call global health — along with humanitarianism, climate change mitigation, development, and food programs — was in grave danger. … I sent personal letters in 2008 to several leaders of major multinational health organizations, urging them to prepare for catastrophic losses in donor support and a far-right takeover of the U.S. government. That moment has now come. Globalization, as a concept and as a trade policy, is under siege. … Here is the bottom line … all global public goods will now face dire, even existential, financial, and political threats as they become secondary victims to the general assault on globalization and liberalism.” She adds “that the two issues of greatest importance to the survival of WHO are its relationships to globalization and to the Trump administration. Both those issues boil down to money: how much will flow into WHO coffers and how will it be spent?” Garrett also writes, “[A] National Security Council dominated by Steve Bannon and Trump’s team seems unlikely to maintain the global health security agenda, linked as it is to Obama and to globalization…” (2/10).