This second Global Forum assessment responds to widespread interest on the part of those who fund research, manage and set priorities in different institutions and use our results to try to improve the health of populations around the world. The study presents a new estimate of global spending on health R&D for 2001 but also exposes major gaps in the availability of good quality data from all sectors, disease-specific information and the measure of complex determinants such as poverty, inequity, and gender.
Monitoring equity and research policy
Monitoring Financial Flows for Health Research
Health policy and systems research agendas in developing countries
Health Research Policy and Systems 2004, 2:6
Health policy and systems research (HPSR) is an international public good with potential to orient investments and performance at national level. Identifying research trends and priorities at international level is therefore important. This paper offers a conceptual framework and defines the HPSR portfolio as a set of research projects under implementation. The research portfolio is influenced by factors external to the research system as well as internal to it. These last include the capacity of research institutions, the momentum of research programs, funding opportunities and the influence of stakeholder priorities and public opinion. These dimensions can vary in their degree of coordination, leading to a complementary or a fragmented research portfolio.
ARVs in resource-poor settings: public health research priorities
Many countries in Africa are planning to provide highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) to millions of people with acquired immune deficiency syndrome. This will be a highly complex therapy programme. Physician-based models of care adapted from industrialized countries will not succeed in providing treatment to the majority of those who need it in resource-constrained settings. Many current ART support programmes are making little or no investment in research, but answering important questions on delivery of HAART will be essential if HAART programmes are to be successful in African nations with a high burden of human immunodeficiency virus infection.
A Proposal for an Essential Health R&D Treaty
Biomedical science and technology are developing at a more rapid pace than ever. Investments in health research and development (R&D) have never been higher—global spending on health research increased from US$30 billion in 1990 to US$105.9 billion in 2001. But despite advances in technology and unparalleled research spending, the medical needs of many of the world's population go unmet. For example, only 1% of new drugs approved between 1975 and 1999 were specifically developed for tropical diseases and tuberculosis—diseases that account for over 10% of the global disease burden. There is a growing demand from many quarters for a new international policy framework. A new international treaty on essential health R&D could provide a binding framework to redirect today's knowledge and scientific expertise to priority health needs. The treaty could help to cement new political commitments and coordinate complementary partnerships aimed at generating and rewarding health innovation as a global public good. This is according to a paper produced by the The Neglected Diseases Group.
The role of NGOs in global health research
Global health research is essential for development. A major issue is the inequitable distribution of research efforts and funds directed towards populations suffering the world's greatest health problems. This imbalance is fostering major attempts at redirecting research to the health problems of low and middle income countries. This article concludes that there is a need to more effectively include NGOs in all aspects of health research in order to maximize the potential benefits of research. NGOs, moreover, can and should play an instrumental role in coalitions for global health research.
Improving Impacts of Research Partnerships
Swiss Commission for Research Partnerships with Developing Countries
"Research is a widely applied instrument for harnessing knowledge and providing insight into complex development issues. It helps in generating options for policy, management and action, and in empowering people and organizations in developing and transition countries, as well as industrialised countries. Ultimately this should make it easier to cope with the challenges of sustainable development under increasingly difficult circumstances. Research for development is therefore frequently placed in an application oriented context, in which concepts like inter and transdisciplinary research, equity, ownership, participation, etc. are widely accepted, but are not always put into practice. Research partnerships of various types and intensities, involving research institutions in industrialised and developing or transition countries, are important means for contributing to knowledge generation and capacity building."
Improving the impact of health services research
BMC Health Services Research 2005, 5:1
"While significant strides have been made in health research, the incorporation of research evidence into healthcare decision-making has been marginal. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of how the utility of health services research can be improved through the use of theory. Integrating theory into health services research can improve research methodology and encourage stronger collaboration with decision-makers. Recognizing the importance of theory calls for new expectations in the practice of health services research. These include: the formation of interdisciplinary research teams; broadening the training for those who will practice health services research; and supportive organizational conditions that promote collaboration between researchers and decision makers. Further, funding bodies can provide a significant role in guiding and supporting the use of theory in the practice of health services research."
Health research equity in global health
This statement, published by the Global Forum for Health Research, reports on its eighth annual meeting, held in Mexico City from 16-20 November 2004, which considered how health research could be used to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Key points outlined in the statement include: (1) a call for renewed effort to close the 10/90 gap in health research by focusing on the diseases that affect the world's poor, essential for achieving the MDG poverty target; (2) the need to address more comprehensively the determinants of health, encompassing health policy and systems research, and the cross-cutting issues of poverty and equity; (3) the requirement to give more prominence to sexual and reproductive health and rights as central to the achievement of the MDGs.
Pushing the international health research agenda towards equity and effectiveness
Despite substantial sums of money being devoted to health research, most of it does not benefit the health of poor people living in developing countries, a matter of concern to civil society networks, such as the People's Health Movement. Health research should play a more influential part in improving the health of poor people, not only through the distribution of knowledge, but also by answering questions, such as why health and healthcare inequities continue to grow despite greatly increased global wealth, enhanced knowledge, and more effective technologies.
Tools for researchers engaged in policy impact
Research and Policy in Development (RAPID) Programme, Overseas Development Institute 2004
“….The number of think tanks worldwide has expanded rapidly over the last two decades as government becomes more receptive to evidence-based policy solutions and seeks new solutions in rapidly changing political environments. What they all have in common is a wish to capture the political imagination; they aim to use their insight to have political impact. This handbook addresses various factors that need to be considered in this process, and provides a comprehensive selection of tools that can be used when attempting to turn research into policy influence…"