Sub-forum on hepatitis C strategies in LMICs – Towards elimination of hepatitis C in Asia: Moving from unaffordable treatments to accessible solutions will be chaired and moderated by Dr Chen Zhongdan, Technical Officer, Hepatitis/TB/HIV/STI, at WHO China.
The 2nd Global Health Forum (GHF) of the Boao Forum for Asia, with the slogan ‘Health for All’, will bring together representatives from governments, not-for-profit organizations, academia, and the private sector to explore the conference theme of ‘Health Beyond Health: In the Year of Sustainable Development 2030‘ through a series of online and offline sessions and activities, with the aim of fostering global cooperation in public health.
The Global Health Forum will focus on three distinct areas: Universal Health Coverage, Innovation for Health, and Health for All Policies. The Forum’s 4-day agenda will include an opening ceremony, two general meetings, 33 sub-forums, and 15 events bringing together over 1,500 in-person participants and a virtual audience of 100 million.
Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) has been invited to speak at the session ‘Towards elimination of hepatitis C in Asia: Moving from unaffordable treatments to accessible solutions‘ on 3 June 2021 (1:30pm-3:00pm CST / 7:30am-9:00am CEST). This session will focus on the initiatives led by low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) in Asia to meet the WHO 2030 elimination targets for hepatitis C.
This year is the first occasion that Dr Marie-Paule Kieny, Chair of the Board of DNDi has been invited to give a keynote address at the Global Health Forum sub-forum on hepatitis C. Dr Kieny will cover the DNDi collaborative R&D model with an emphasis on equitable and sustainable access to treatment for the most neglected populations. She will also discuss the need for new players with strong leadership from the Global South to innovate and bridge essential health gaps for the most neglected.
DNDi Chair, Dr Marie-Paule will be joined by five panelists at the sub-forum: Malaysia’s Director-General of Health, Dr Noor Hisham bin Abdullah; Ms Zhu Zhenyan, Third World Network (TWN); Mr Mickael Le Paih, Head of Mission MSF, Cambodia; Dr Jing Sun, Associate Professor of Pharmaceutical Policy, Peking Union Medical College (PUMC); and Dr Jinzi J. Wu, Founder, Chairman and CEO, Ascletis, China.
The LMIC led panel will discuss key issues in hepatitis C treatment and present tried and tested tools and strategies that may help to shape China’s hepatitis C elimination journey. The key areas of this discussion include:
- Addressing IP barriers in hepatitis C treatment for improved access strategies for LMICs
- Hepatitis C public health leadership: Malaysia’s hepatitis C journey – access, affordability, testing, and decentralization strategies
- Financing and delivering the hepatitis C treatment in China – Overcoming barriers for patient access
- Hepatitis C public health scaling-up: Diagnostics and treatment strategies to enable scale-up and a public health approach to hepatitis C – Case study from treatment programme in Preah Kossamak Hospital, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
- Hepatitis C innovation, production, public health scaling-up
For more information, please visit: http://www.ghfbfa.cn
Photo credit: Xinhua/Yang Guanyu
