Healthcare workers take a stand against TPP

Nurses and healthcare workers from across the Pacific, Latin America and North America are condemning the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. In an open letter to trade ministers and government leaders, 17 nurses' organizations, including AFT Nurses and Health Professionals, say TPP poses too great a threat to healthcare for them to remain silent.

"The principles of universal healthcare are based on equitable access to affordable healthcare," says Rosa Pavanelli, general secretary of Public Services International. "The TPP undermines those principles. Nurses, midwives and health workers know what happens when profit is put before people in the health system."

Healthcare workers are concerned that health is being pushed aside in the interests of profit and wider geopolitical maneuvering, says Pavanelli. "In an age where governments around the world are commenting about the increasing costs of healthcare, their trade ministers are negotiating a deal that will see the cost of healthcare rise purely to the benefit of multinational companies' profit margins."

The letter says that the TPP will see the cost of medicines rise as access to generic medicines is delayed and pharmaceutical manufacturers are given unprecedented access to government decision-making bodies. The letter also raises concerns about a range of harmful effects, such as limits on governments' ability to regulate healthcare providers; restrictions on adequate food labeling that enables people to understand what they are eating; and opening the way for more private healthcare multinationals to have greater influence on healthcare policy.

The members of these organizations are calling on trade ministers and government leaders to withdraw from TPP negotiations until the contents of the deal are released and the impact on healthcare can be openly debated.

"Health is everyone's concern, and decisions about our communities' healthcare should be openly and democratically decided, not traded in secrecy," the letter states.

[PSI press release]