Global summit underscores vital role of social development in addressing NCDs
At the Second World Summit for Social Development (WSSD) in Doha this week, thirty years after the first WSSD was held in 1995, governments have agreed to act on a wide range of social development challenges in the Doha Political Declaration. The focus on social development is not only timely in an era of multiple global crises, it is absolutely vital for meeting SDG target 3.4 – a one-third reduction in premature deaths from NCDs and greater promotion of mental health and well-being by 2030.
Health outcomes are closely tied to social development. This is because the environments in which we live - our education, housing, employment, and access to healthy food and clean air - profoundly shape our health and ability to seek care.
We see the impact of inequalities and financial hardship slowing progress on tackling NCDs – people born in the country with the highest life expectancy live, on average, 33 years longer than those born in the country with the lowest life expectancy. At the same time, NCDs alone are costing the world an average of more than US$2 trillion per year, through reduced productivity and human capital, as well as increased healthcare costs.
NCD Alliance welcomes the Doha Political Declaration adopted this week at the Second World Summit for Social Development, as it takes a step in the right direction to address this relationship, reaffirming the right of all to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, and strengthening and deepening commitments to achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC).
This includes clauses on ensuring equitable access to medicines and health products; the reaffirmation of the role of mental health services as an essential component of UHC; cooperation in the transfer of technology (on mutually agreed terms); and the strengthening of affordable, equitable and accessible universal health care systems, based on a primary healthcare approach.
“Fighting poverty requires targeted, country-led investment and strategies in all the systems that people need, [including]… universally accessible health systems, that can deliver care and medicine to every person, no matter where they live, or how much they earn.” - Secretary General Antonio Guterres, plenary session of the Second World Summit on Social Development
The Declaration also contains commitments on a range of issues beyond the health system, from tackling poverty, to labour conditions, to food security, to transport and infrastructure, and beyond. These factors are key determinants of health, representing a crucial part of the NCD agenda.
Particularly welcome in the Declaration is a recognition of the need to promote a sustainable wellbeing economy and strengthen social protection systems. This connects the Declaration to issues set to be addressed in WHO’s upcoming Economics of Health for All strategy, the next milestone in the link between health and economic development.
The Doha Political Declaration contains detailed and extensive commitments to achieving gender equality, and while it is disappointing that mention of women’s health is limited to sexual and reproductive health rather than recognizing women’s health needs across the life course, the commitments to achieving gender, and racial, equality go to important social determinants of health for addressing NCDs.
Given these key clauses, both on health systems and on other social determinants, the Doha Political Declaration - together with the Sevilla Commitment on Financing for Development - is an essential compliment to the Political Declaration of the 2025 UN High-Level Meeting on NCDs and Mental Health (NCD Political Declaration) that is expected to soon be adopted by the UN General Assembly. Taken together, these documents provide a more comprehensive framework for addressing NCDs than the NCDs Political Declaration alone.
But some key issues are still missing. While commitments on health taxes have been included in the NCD Political Declaration and the Sevilla Commitment, such a pledge is notably missing from the Doha Political Declaration - despite the crucial role that taxing unhealthy products plays in promoting health equity, improving health outcomes and mobilising domestic resources. And while commitments on food security and nutrition in the Doha Political Declaration positively recognise malnutrition in all its forms, they still fail to address commercial determinants of health, including the marketing of unhealthy products.
As a result, while the Doha Political Declaration take a welcome step forward in reaffirming the connection between social development and health, it still does not fully recognise the two-way nature of this connection: health is not only an outcome of strong social development, but also a pre-condition for inclusive, sustainable economic growth and social progress.