Statement made at the 78th World Health Assembly on 20 May 2025
Agenda item 16.1: Strengthening the global architecture for health emergency prevention, preparedness, response and resilience
Honourable Chair, Distinguished Delegates,
Five of the organizations supporting this statement are members of the World Health Professions Alliance, which represents over 41 million health professionals worldwide.
The frequency, scale and complexity of health emergencies are ever increasing, and they require global, multilateral action.
We welcome pandemic treaty's commitments to provide frontline health professionals with priority access to medical products and personal protective equipment (PPE) during emergencies and ensuring decent working conditions while protecting health professionals' safety, mental health and wellbeing.
We also support research that strengthens the health workforce before, during, and after emergencies.
We call on governments to address the five core capacities in HEPPRR identified in this agenda item, and emphasize protecting health professionals from:
1. preventable adverse events in emergencies, where health professionals are among the most vulnerable;
2. all forms of workplace violence—verbal, physical, and emotional.
It is essential to implement preventative security measures, such as surveillance systems and emergency response protocols, for their safety.
Recent drastic funding cuts to the global health sector are having immediate disastrous impacts on the health workforce on the front lines, even in non-emergency contexts. This comes on top of persistent global health workforce shortages, albeit with some patchy progress.
These cuts and shortages reduce the health workforce’s capacity for emergency response and leave no scope for scalable health workforce provision in emergencies.
WHPA calls on member states to invest in health professionals’ education, employment conditions, training and retention as a priority.
Constituency statement made on behalf of:
- FDI World Dental Federation
- International Council of Nurses
- International Pharmaceutical Federation
- World Medical Association
- World Confederation of Physical Therapy (World Physiotherapy)
International Association of Dental Research (IADR)