Health and human development in a globalised world
What you must be able to define and use
Understand globalisation as the increasing integration and interdependence of economies, societies and cultures, driven by trade, investment, technology, travel and communication. Know its positive and negative effects on health and human development: positives include access to medicines, knowledge sharing, economic growth, improved food supply and emergency response; negatives include the spread of infectious disease, marketing of unhealthy products, tobacco and alcohol availability, environmental damage, exploitative labour and widening inequality. Learn the role of international organisations: the World Health Organization (global health leadership, standards, surveillance), United Nations agencies such as UNICEF, UNAIDS and the World Food Programme, the World Bank (financing), and non-government organisations such as the Red Cross and Oxfam. Know the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially SDG 3 (good health and well-being), and how the goals are interrelated. Understand aid types: emergency/humanitarian, bilateral, multilateral, and non-government aid, and the features of effective aid - ownership by the recipient country, focus on sustainability, partnership, transparency and addressing the needs identified by the community.
Traps that appear in questions
- Describing globalisation as only positive or only negative.
- Confusing bilateral (government-to-government) with multilateral (through an international organisation) aid.
- Listing aid types without evaluating effectiveness.
- Confusing the WHO (health) with the World Bank (finance) or UNICEF (children).
- Ignoring that SDG 3 depends on progress in education, water, poverty and equality.
Rule of thumb
Use 'who benefits, who is harmed, and what could reduce the harm' for any globalisation question. For aid questions, apply the criteria: ownership, sustainability, partnership, transparency, and focus on the most disadvantaged.
Worked example: 'Evaluate the impact of globalisation on health in low-income countries.' Structure: define globalisation; positive (access to vaccines and medicines, knowledge sharing, employment); negative (imported processed foods and tobacco marketing, spread of disease, environmental damage, labour exploitation); then a judgement - benefits are uneven and depend on national capacity and regulation.