By: Taliyah Winn

The World Health Assembly’s (WHA) second day has seen fragmentation into 10 working groups to tackle the issue of women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health. The working groups are largely divided into regional blocs, creating working papers like BB, composed of African Member States, and working paper HH, which is mostly European Member States. 

Common themes have emerged among the different working groups including sexual and reproductive health, violence and employment. Representative Ethan Harp of Israel said that the working paper JJ was distinct from others due to its explicit mentions of sovereignty and cultural respect, which he saw lacking in other papers. “JJ is the only paper that mentions this word (sovereignty) which I find showing.” 

Representative Alex Lee of Slovenia said that the working paper HH also had a specialized focus: “Slovenia fully supports draft resolution HH specifically because it addresses a part of medical care that we often ignore… emergency medical systems [EMS],” Representative Lee said in a speech to the assembly, “Our resolution specifically… promotes EMS systems to countries who lack care.”

Despite these specificities, some felt it was time to recognize the shared goals of the WHA and begin the merging process. 

“Brazil humbly requests we look at merging some of our resolutions rather than work in isolation based on our respective regions,” Representative Omotola Akingba of Brazil said. “We all want the same thing, which is aimed at improving women’s, children’s and adolescents’ overall wellbeing and empowerment.”

Now, it’s up to Representatives to negotiate and compromise on the content in their resolutions to build toward a merging process that has yet to begin.