PLOS Medicine: Equity and Noncommunicable Disease Reduction under the Sustainable Development Goals
In this essay, Harald Schmidt and Anne Barnhill of the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine discuss the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and a target to reduce premature mortality from noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) “…To give meaningful substance to the SDGs’ call to reduce inequalities, there needs to be an unambiguous acknowledgment that pursuing cost-effective interventions and achieving overall NCD mortality reductions is insufficient. The urgent moral demand in terms of promoting equity is to improve the situation of the worst off. Three concrete measures can help make progress towards this end…” They suggest clarity in SDG wording, prioritizing targets, and equity guidance (9/8).