NCDI Poverty National Commission Initiator’s Workshop – building capacity to address the burden of NCDIs for the poorest billion

On December 5th, the Program in Global NCDs and Social Change at Harvard Medical School with support from the NCD Synergies program at Partners In Health hosted a four-day NCDI Poverty National Commission Initiator’s Workshop at the Harvard Medical School Center for Global Health Delivery in Dubai, UAE. The Workshop brought together Ministry of Health and implementer colleagues from across 16 low and lower-middle income countries.

National NCDI Poverty Commissions are an initiative of The Lancet Commission on Reframing NCDs and Injuries for the Poorest Billion. They are a group of low- and lower-middle income countries with large concentrations of people among the poorest billion to assess the burden of disease from NCDIs, and to identify policies and integrated delivery platforms that would effectively address and reduce that burden.

45 participants and faculty joined together in Dubai, UAE for a four-day NCDI Poverty National Commission Initiator’s Workshop.

The Workshop welcomed 45 participants and facilitators to delve into the work of the National NCDI Poverty Commissions that has been accomplished by the 10 established groups, and provided an exploratory platform for six new countries to begin the Commission process.

Participant-facilitators included representatives from Afghanistan, Haiti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mozambique, Nepal, Rwanda and Tanzania from the existing National NCDI Poverty Commissions. In addition, we were joined by Ministry of Health colleagues and national NCDI implementers from Chhattisgarh State in India, Madagascar, Sierra Leone, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.