Mr. Daniel Dulca, PABSEC Deputy Secretary General, attended the Virtual Workshop entitled “Universal Health Coverage and Equity: Always Hand in Hand?”, which was organized by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), on 26 October 2021.

The event took place in an online format, with the participation of parliamentarian members of the Health Committees, parliamentary staff supporting parliamentary work on health, members of the IPU Advisory Group on Health and representatives of parliamentary assemblies.

The meeting was moderated by Ms. Aleksandra Blagojevic, Programme Manager for International Development, IPU. A welcome speech was made by Jose Ignacio Echaniz, Vice-Chair of the IPU Advisory Group on Health, Member of Parliament of Spain.

The event included presentations from: Ms. Aleksandra Blagojevic, Programme Manager for International Development, Inter-Parliamentary Union; Mr. David Clarke, Team Leader, UHC and Health Systems - Law, World Health Organization; Ms. Ranjana Kumar - Head, Health Systems Planning, Management and Performance, Country Programmes, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance; Ms. Sarai Nuñez, Member of Parliament of Mexico, Member of the IPU Advisory Group on Health.

The specific objectives of the webinar were to: Build understanding of the linkages between Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and equity and how parliaments can pursue equity objectives; Promote inter-parliamentary exchanges on concrete strategies to improve health equity through UHC and emerging challenges in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic; Launch the IPU brief: “A Winnable Battle: Parliamentarians and universal health coverage”; Build accountability for the implementation of the resolution by parliaments and collect information on country efforts to inform the global parliamentary community, in follow up to the 2019 resolution on UHC; Identify specific needs and areas in which parliaments require further support to move towards UHC.

The virtual workshop is part of the process of following up the IPU resolution on Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and will help inform about the future IPU activities, aiming at strengthening the parliamentary engagement on UHC and the support of national parliaments in this area.

The parliamentary practices and challenges shared during the workshop will be included into an annual summary of the IPU Advisory Group on Health where it will take stock of different national experiences, also identifying the lessons learnt and the gaps in the implementation of the IPU resolution on UHC.