Book Challenges ‘Neoliberal’ Approach In Global Public Health Policy

By Julia Fraser for Intellectual Property Watch

A recent book by a UK journalist and lecturer illustrates that recent reforms in global public health policy have ignored public health needs in favour of market-based ideologies.

Health Policy Reform: Global Health versus Private Profit by John Lister analyses the motivations behind international reforms in health policy. It strongly argues that recent reforms have been politically and financially driven by neoliberal and capitalist ideologies. This has lead to more unequal, costly and unaccountable healthcare systems, instead benefitting the private sector. Lister focuses on reforms in the UK’s National Health Service, and applies this to the wider global context.

The book is an update of Lister’s earlier book Health Policy Reform: Driving the Wrong Way. John Lister is s well-known UK-based journalist, researcher, and campaigner for publicly funded, publicly provided universal health care. He is currently a senior lecturer in Health Journalism at Coventry University in the UK.

The book is published by Libri Publishing, and can be purchased here.