Over the years, we have worked on several themes and programmes. Below we present some of them.
Wemos was the lead organization of the project Action for Health and Equity: Addressing medical Deserts (AHEAD), a European Commission-funded partnership that focused on reducing health inequalities by addressing medical deserts in Europe. We set out to better understand medical deserts in Italy, Moldova, the Netherlands, Romania and Serbia, and raise awareness about the need for urgent joint European action, to ultimately contribute to improving access to health care and sufficient, skilled and motivated health workers. We aimed to do this by building knowledge on medical deserts, designing a visual tool to identify medical deserts, and by proposing policy options for medical deserts in participatory consensus-building workshops with local and national stakeholders.
With the project, we put medical deserts on the agenda at EU-level during a policy dialogue event that we organized in the European Parliament, presenting our policy recommendations to tackle medical deserts.
AHEAD consisted of Center for Health Policies and Services (Romania), Cittadinanzattiva (Italy), Media Education Centre (Serbia), National School of Public Health Management (Moldova), VU Athena Institute (Netherlands) and Wemos. The project ran from April 2021 – May 2023.
From March 2020 to December 2022, Wemos was the lead organization in the “International consortium promoting Covid-19 Innovations for All” (CIFA). Leading experts and health organizations worked together to mobilize support and political will for equitable access to Covid-19 vaccines by sharing relevant technologies and knowledge. Consortium members brought in their extensive knowledge and experience in access to medicines and intellectual property, as well as relevant networks at national, regional (specifically the Americas and the European Union) and global levels, and contacts with influential media.
Our consortium partners were: Corporación Innovarte (Chile), Knowledge Ecology International (United States), Medicines Law & Policy (Netherlands), Health Action International (Netherlands) and the Pharmaceutical Accountability Foundation (Netherlands)
From 2016-2020, we were part of the Health Systems Advocacy Partnership (HSAP), together with Amref Flying Doctors, African Centre for Global Health and Social Transformation (ACHEST) and Health Action International (HAI), with funding from the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The aim was to fundamentally strengthen health systems in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, with a focus on essential, quality sexual and reproductive health services.
Wemos focused on two themes: financing for health and human resources for health. We analysed international policies affecting health systems and examined their effects on partner countries. We then used these country studies for evidence-based lobbying towards the Dutch government and relevant European and international institutions. Together with African and international NGOs, we strengthened national, regional and international lobbying.
This video explains the interconnectedness between health systems and sexual and reproductive health and rights, and that that strong health systems should be a political priority.
With the Harmful Substances programme (2013-2018), we advocated a safe, EDC-free living environment for Dutch and European citizens. We elevated the topic on the Dutch political agenda, influenced the development of criteria for EDCs and the development of a European strategy, and generated a lot of media attention.
For years, Wemos worked on the topic of clinical trials in low- and middle-income countries. Our reports on trials in Egypt, Kenya, Zimbabwe and South Africa showed that existing ethical guidelines were not always followed, exposing subjects to health risks and human rights violations. We often worked together with SOMO and Public Eye on this.
From 2013 until early 2016, Wemos coordinated the European project Health Workers for All (HW4All), in which civil society organizations from Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain and the United Kingdom collaborated to contribute to a sustainable health workforce policy worldwide. Project partners developed and disseminated policy analysis tools, and organized workshops and dialogues at national and European level. In addition, they monitored how member states identify and address future shortages of healthcare personnel. The project contributed to the Joint Action on Health Workforce Planning and Forecasting.
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