The FOPH works on various health issues requiring international coordination. Find out here about topics including the migration of medical personnel and international drugs policy.
International collaborations are intended to help protect the Swiss population from global health risks. The WHO promotes such collaborations among its member states, and offers the necessary technical support to strengthen national and global early warning, monitoring, prevention and response systems.
Patient safety is a central issue in global public health, fundamental to strengthening health systems and providing high quality healthcare. Switzerland is also focusing on this issue.
In many countries, people still do not have access to the medicines they need in order to ensure an acceptable state of health. Switzerland is committed to facilitate access to medicines while safeguarding the protection of intellectual property rights which are drivers for research and innovation.
Drawing on experience, Switzerland belongs to the countries that are promoting approaches to public health, and that place the human dimension firmly at the centre of national and international drug policy.
Alcohol, smoking, a lack of exercise and poor diet are the main causes of chronic diseases, both in Switzerland and worldwide. In this area, Switzerland’s activities are aligned with WHO’s global and European action plans.
The quality of healthcare offered depends very much on the available health workers and, in particular, on health workers from abroad. These migrations, however, lead to shortages in the departure country. A growing global awareness has prompted action in this respect, and Switzerland has contributed to these measures on both international and national level.
Switzerland uses comparisons and analyses to identify the strengths, weaknesses and challenges of its health system. Switzerland is involved in a number of international bodies whose task is to facilitate inter-system comparisons.
Almost half of the world’s population has no access to essential health services. Each year nearly hundred million people face extreme poverty because of the money they have to spend on health services.
