BMJ  2007;335 (15 September), doi:10.1136/bmj.39336.570116.47

Editor's Choice

The fight for primary care

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Thirty years ago next year, the Alma Ata Declaration set a new framework for international health. At a meeting convened by WHO in the capital of what is now Kazakhstan, the world's nations agreed that health was far more than the absence of disease, that it was an inalienable right, that urgent action was needed to tackle health inequities between and within countries, and that primary care was the key to achieving health for all. The year 2000 came and went with fireworks but with health still in the hands of the world's wealthy few. As the new deadline of 2015 nears, we should examine how far we are from Alma Ata's vision.

Few can doubt the vision itself, but in most parts of the world the reality lags far behind. Many countries lack basic healthcare infrastructure. Shiny, high tech hospitals symbolise progress and prestige far more powerfully than basic . . . [Full text of this article]

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