Working Group on Health (WG-H)

Chaired by Jeffrey Sachs, Director, The Earth Institute

Background

The Broadband Commission for Digital Development was launched by Dr. Hamadoun Touré, Secretary-General of the ITU, and Ms Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO, in May 2010 in response to the call by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Ban Ki-Moon, to step up UN efforts to help accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Its main aim is to highlight the importance of broadband in helping boost achievement of the MDGs. It unites senior policy-makers and top executives from the telecommunication industry in a bid to extend the benefits of high-speed Internet to people around the world. To focus the work of this influential set of leaders, the Commission established eight Working Groups on various key thematic areas.

Objectives

The Working Group aims to:

• Identify and target possible partnerships which could result in scale-up initiatives in the Millennium Villages (e.g. in Nigeria);
• Increase training for Community Health Workers (CHWs) by leveraging ICT and more specifically mobile broadband services;
• Provide a test-bed for quantifying the impact of broadband penetration on social and economic development (and the MDGs).

Activities

The group, chaired by Professor Jeffrey Sachs of the Earth Institute, was launched via teleconference on 6 April 2011. The group has held another two meetings, one via Teleconference in May and the other in person as a side event to the Paris meeting on 6 June 2011.

Outcomes

The Working Group on Health will identify path-breaking opportunities for broadband-based solutions to advance primary health systems and determine the most effective ways to scale them up (Appendix_WG-H_MVP_Innovations.pdf

Membership

WG-H comprises the following members, including representatives of 20 Commissioners and 7 external members: