Photo credit: https://www.un.org/en/observances/human-rights-day
Author: Joan Marston, PallCHASE Advocacy WG Lead and Executive Committee member
On World Human Rights Day 2024 the World Humanitarian Report 2025 is a challenging document highlighting the immense number of people caught up in humanitarian crises, an estimated 305.1 million in 2025 ; with one in five children living in or fleeing from conflict. There is an urgency for palliative care to step up our advocacy and activities to integrate palliative care into the humanitarian response, where death, trauma, loss and suffering increase exponentially.
Palliative Care is a human right- but globally only 14% of those who need it access it. With children the access is only 3%. And very, very few receive palliative care in humanitarian situations.
The recent WISH Report November 2024. Palliative Care: How can we respond to 10 years of limited progress? Identifies integration into primary and community care as the most effective way of reaching the Universal Health Coverage goals despite variations in quality and coverage. The Report also identifies gaps in provision, the need for more focus on low- and middle-income countries and proposes actions that should be taken highlighting collaborative efforts, integration and targeted interventions, which include education and research. The Report can be downloaded at the whpca.org website.
A “New-Old” dimension of caring that integrates core values is proposed in a well-researched and thoughtful paper co-authored by Rachel Coghlan, Nazanin Zadeh-Cummings, Mila Petrova and Paul Spiegel .
Their research focus is on three core concepts – the humanitarian -development nexus, decoloniality and localisation; and looks at commonalities in the traditions, ethos, and ethics of humanitarianism and palliative care. While examining the history integrates the stories of those living in a humanitarian setting.
As we advocate for palliative care in humanitarian aid situations and emergencies, the PallCHASE core activities – Education, Research, Advocacy and Communication – must be linked to our shared core values of compassion, kindness, developed expertise and humanity.
References
- Harding, R et al. WHO. Wish Forum Report. November 2024. Palliative Care. How can we respond to 10 years of limited progress. (thewhpca.org)
Rachel Coghlan, Nazanin Zadeh-Cummings, Mila Petrova and Paul Spiegel. The “New-Old” Dimensions of Caring in Humanitarian Response: The Opportunity for Public Health Palliative Care to Advance the Humanitarian - Development Nexus, Decoloniality, and Localization Thought. The Journal of Health Care Organization, Provision and Financing. Open access. September 11th 2024
- WHO World Humanitarian Overview 2025 (OCHA) humanitarianaction.info
