Germany has been increasingly stepping up its political and financial engagement in global health. Having made global health a priority during its presidency of the G7, Germany has continued this commitment throughout its presidency of the G20. In May 2017, Germany held the first ever meeting of the G20 ministers of health. The meeting was held in Berlin and provided an important platform for discussions and commitments around global health security, health systems strengthening and antimicrobial resistance.

Berlin itself is becoming widely recognised as a centre for global health debate, welcoming a number of important conferences and events around health, human rights and social protection. One of the most important annual events in Berlin’s global health calendar is the annual World Health Summit. This year’s Summit took place from 15-17 October and brought together 2000 participants from more than 100 countries.

UNAIDS has supported the Summit for a number of years and this year the Deputy Executive Director of UNAIDS Luiz Loures, participated in a range of sessions and panels from global health security to community health workers.

UNAIDS and German Healthcare Partnership co-organized a panel on the importance of strengthening innovation and health systems in Africa which brought together more than 100 participants from government, the private sector and regional and international organizations to explore opportunities to create firm partnerships and promote innovation.

Panellist Bernard Haufiku, Minister of Health of Namibia, said, “The concept of community health care workers is brilliant to me,” said “They are from the community, they live in the community, and they understand the community, its culture its problems.”

Other panellists included the Minister of Health of Ghana Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, Head of the Division of Health, Nutrition and Population at the African Union Commission Margaret Anyetei-Agama, Novartis Foundation Head of Global Health Portfolio Bakhuti Shengelia, and Deputy Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency Dazhu Yang.

“We are putting a strong emphasis on boosting government commitments to strengthen health systems across the region, building the political will to address priority challenges and developing appropriate financing mechanisms to make services affordable,” said Dr Anyetei-Agama.

Also in Berlin another important symposium was taking place alongside the World Health Summit. “HIV in Eastern Europe – the unnoticed epidemic”, a symposium organized by Deutsche AIDS Hilfe, Action against AIDS Germany and Brot für die Welt brought together civil society from Eastern Europe and Germany to look at finding solutions to the challenges in the response to HIV in Eastern Europe where HIV infection rates are rising, treatment coverage is low and international funding is decreasing.

“People who use drugs, men who have sex with men and sex workers of all genders are not the problem, but part of the solution!” said Sylvia Urban, Chairwoman Action against AIDS Germany and Chairwoman Deutsche AIDS-Hilfe. “There is no alternative to including them and their actual needs in HIV-prevention and treatment strategies in Eastern Europe if those strategies are to be successful. Germanys very own HIV-prevention programs can be used as a blueprint: When the government works with communities and partners with civil society organizations, the results are great.”

Mr Loures joined the debate and voiced his concerns about Eastern Europe. “Despite all the scientific and economic progress, the HIV epidemic is continuing to grow in Eastern Europe,” said Mr Loures. “We have the tools, knowledge and medicines; however, there is a global epidemic of discrimination and without addressing this we will not be able to make the progress that is needed. Leadership and solidarity of civil society and communities from Germany and from Eastern Europe is essential.”

UNAIDS welcomes Germany’s commitment to health and encourages Germany to continue to develop its strong position as a leader in global health and will continue to work closely with Germany in our joint efforts towards ending the AIDS epidemic and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.