Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs attended the Foreign Policy and Global Health (FPGH) Ministers’ Virtual Meeting which he highlighted the importance of partnership, preparedness and prevention in responding to COVID-19 and called all countries to galvanise the necessary political will to ensure an enabling environment of peace, security and stability that will truly facilitate the collective fight against COVID-19.

On 3 September 2020, H.E. Mr. Don Pramudwinai, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Thailand, attended the Foreign Policy and Global Health (FPGH) Ministers’ Virtual Meeting, along with his ministerial counterparts from other FPGH member countries – Brazil, France, Indonesia, Norway, Senegal and South Africa – to exchange views on “Affordable Health Care For All: collective action to ensure the worldwide accessibility and affordability of vaccines and medicines” which is currently a very critical issue in the context of COVID-19.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs emphasized the importance of multilateral cooperation in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, by focusing on (1) strengthening partnership in developing COVID-19 vaccines and related COVID-19 health-related technologies as global public goods, (2) enhancing preparedness by improving health infrastructure and services, as well as investing in Universal Health Coverage, Primary Health Care, and the health workforce and (3) promoting prevention, in particular by enhancing health promotion, to lessen the burden on health systems.

The Foreign Policy and Global Health (FPGH) Initiative, launched in 2006, brings together seven countries that place importance on health diplomacy. Thailand, as Chair of the FPGH in 2017, successfully put forward two UN General Assembly resolutions, one marking 12 December as the International Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Day and the other calling for the convening of the High-level Meeting on UHC in September 2019 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.