Making Health Markets Work for the Poor

040 Trent Hall, 310 Trent Drive, Durham, NC

Making Health Markets Work for the Poor

040 Trent Hall, 310 Trent Drive, Durham, NC

Onno Schellekens

Managing Director
PharmAccess Foundation

About the Lecture

Onno Schellekens will talk about how public and private stakeholders can work together to make health markets work for the poor. The key is to address market failures by building institutions from the bottom up, to lower risks, increase mutual trust, and thus reduce costs, increase investments, and spur demand & supply cycles in healthcare. Onno will show that public-private partnerships focusing on such efforts can fast-track development in countries where the public sector doesn’t deliver quality care to the vast majority of its poor population. In doing so, partners must combine practical implementation of innovative finance & delivery models, with scientific research and evidence-based advocacy, to achieve lasting results.

Lunch will be provided.

About the Speaker

Onno Schellekens is the Managing Director of the PharmAccess Foundation, founded in 2001 by the late Dr. Joep Lange to pioneer HIV/AIDS treatment in Africa. PharmAccess aims to improve access to affordable, quality healthcare for people in sub-Saharan Africa. It mobilizes public and private resources for the benefit of African doctors and patients through health insurance, loans for healthcare providers (Medical Credit Fund), clinical and operational quality standards (SafeCare) and private equity (Investment Fund for Health in Africa). The organization operates in close collaboration with the Dutch Ministry of International Trade and Development and many of the main innovators in global health.

PharmAccess’s work to strengthen health systems with a special focus on the private sector, is gaining international support. Onno’s essay ‘A new paradigm for increased access to healthcare in Africa’ was among the winners in the 2008 IFC/Financial Times Essay competition. At the 2010 Seoul Summit, President Obama presented him with the G20 SME Finance Challenge Award for the Medical Credit Fund’s innovative financing model. And last year, PharmAccess and its partners were recognized by the OECD-DAC prize for ‘Taking Development Innovation to Scale’ for their program in Kwara State, Nigeria.