2018 Political declaration of the third HLM on NCDs

73rd UNGA
10 Oct 2018

Res­o­lu­tion A/RES/73/2

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Analysis of precedential value

This dec­la­ra­tion is the prod­uct of the third High-Level Meet­ing on the Pre­ven­tion and Con­trol of Non-Com­mu­ni­ca­ble Dis­eases in Sep­tem­ber 2018. It was adopted by the UN Gen­eral Assem­bly with­out a gen­eral vote the fol­low­ing month. The Gen­eral Assem­bly is the pre­em­i­nent gov­ern­ing body of the UN sys­tem and con­sists of all 193 UN Mem­ber States.

Used as precedent

key and vulnerable populations

• “Acknowl­edge the impact of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases on older per­sons, which is of par­tic­u­lar con­cern, given the grow­ing pro­por­tion of older per­sons and rec­og­niz­ing that they have an increased risk of mul­ti­ple non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases, which con­sti­tutes a major chal­lenge for health sys­tems.” (para­graph 13)

• “Imple­ment, accord­ing to own-coun­try-led pri­or­i­ti­za­tion, a set of cost-effec­tive, afford­able and evi­dence-based inter­ven­tions and good prac­tices, includ­ing those rec­om­mended by the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion, for the pre­ven­tion and con­trol of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases, that can be scaled up across pop­u­la­tions to pro­mote health, treat peo­ple with non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases and pro­tect those at risk of devel­op­ing them, with a par­tic­u­lar empha­sis on the needs of those in vul­ner­a­ble sit­u­a­tions.” (para­graph 19)

• “Take mea­sures to bet­ter pre­pare the health sys­tems to respond to the needs of the rapidly age­ing pop­u­la­tion, includ­ing the need for pre­ven­tive, cura­tive, pal­lia­tive and spe­cial­ized care for older per­sons, tak­ing into account the dis­pro­por­tion­ate bur­den of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases on older per­sons, and that pop­u­la­tion age­ing is a con­tribut­ing fac­tor in the ris­ing inci­dence and preva­lence of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases.” (para­graph 29)

gender equality

• “Acknowl­edge that main­stream­ing a gen­der per­spec­tive into the pre­ven­tion and con­trol of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases is cru­cial to under­stand­ing and address­ing the health risks and needs of women and men of all ages, giv­ing par­tic­u­lar atten­tion to the impact of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases on women in all set­tings.” (para­graph 14)

societal enablers

• “Reaf­firm the pri­mary role and respon­si­bil­ity of gov­ern­ments at all lev­els in respond­ing to the chal­lenge of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases by devel­op­ing ade­quate national mul­ti­sec­toral responses for their pre­ven­tion and con­trol, and pro­mot­ing and pro­tect­ing the right of every­one to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health, and under­score the impor­tance of pur­su­ing whole-of-gov­ern­ment and whole-of-soci­ety approaches, as well as health-in-all-poli­cies approaches, equity-based approaches and life-course approaches.” (para­graph 15)

human rights

• “Take the nec­es­sary mea­sures to rec­og­nize the right of every­one to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health across the life course, in respect­ing human rights oblig­a­tions and address­ing the spe­cific health needs of chil­dren, women, older per­sons, per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and oth­ers who are more vul­ner­a­ble to non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases.” (para­graph 28)

access to health products

• “Pro­mote increased access to afford­able, safe, effec­tive and qual­ity med­i­cines and diag­nos­tics and other tech­nolo­gies, reaf­firm­ing the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), as amended, and also reaf­firm­ing the 2001 Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, which rec­og­nizes that intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of Mem­ber States to pro­tect pub­lic health and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, and notes the need for appro­pri­ate incen­tives in the devel­op­ment of new health prod­ucts.” (para­graph 36)

key population and community leadership

• “Pro­mote mean­ing­ful civil soci­ety engage­ment to encour­age Gov­ern­ments to develop ambi­tious national mul­ti­sec­toral responses for the pre­ven­tion and con­trol of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases, and to con­trib­ute to their imple­men­ta­tion, forge multi‐stake­holder part­ner­ships and alliances that mobi­lize and share knowl­edge, assess progress, pro­vide ser­vices and amplify the voices of and raise aware­ness about peo­ple liv­ing with and affected by non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases.” (para­graph 42)