Oxford Health Alliance

The Oxford Health Alliance (OxHA) is an international think-and-action tank dedicated to confronting the epidemic of chronic diseases, notably the four ‘big’ diseases (heart disease, diabetes, cancers and chronic respiratory disease) that are responsible for 50-60% of the world’s mortality.

The OxHA Asia Pacific Regional Centre was launched at the University of Sydney in late 2005 under the joint leadership and remit of Professors Ruth Colagiuri and Stephen Leeder. Since then, OxHA Asia-Pacific has steadily built a network of over 100 people and organisations, from Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Korea, Vietnam, Mongolia, the Philippines, China and various Pacific Island countries, in a coalition of people committed to stemming the tide of chronic diseases. The list represents a range of public and private sectors and includes people from ministries of health, food and pharmaceutical companies, research and academia, clinical services, employee unions, NGOs (diabetes, heart, kidney and cancer), WHO-Western Pacific Regional Office (WPRO) and the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, private health related organisations and government organisations.

Ad hoc OxHA related activities in 2006 included interviews and responses on behalf of OxHA on topical issues, and making presentations publicising OxHA and representing OxHA at various meetings, for example at the October 2006 WHO-WPRO Implementation Meeting for the Global Diet and Physical Activity Strategy.

In 2006 OxHA Asia Pacific also worked on building relationships within the food industry – both manufacturers and retailers – with a view to gaining an understanding of the issues and the possibilities for improving the quality of fast food in particular, and these efforts will continue in 2007. Major formal activities in 2006 have centred on:

A small working group is being established to explore ways in which health policy can be used to shape legal policy and vice versa. The group is headed by Justice Terry Sheahan, President of the NSW Worker’s Compensation Commission and a well known and respected legal figure in Australia.

The Working Group will focus on the workplace and the (physical) environment. Terms of Reference for the working group have been agreed and a the group has commenced the process of scooping the parameters of a discussion paper which will be developed to contribute to the next global Oxford Health Alliance Summit which will take place in Sydney in 2008.

A series of Oxford Dialogues on the Law & Health Policy are being held on the topic of "The law and health in relation to the workplace and the physical environment".

Summaries of discussions are available here:

12 February 2007

21 June 2007

In March 2006 OxHA published a monograph prepared by a TDU staff member and colleagues entitled It’s Happening: the Strike Back on Chronic Diseases. The purpose of this document was to provoke thought and debate about broader political and socioeconomic determinants of global health, specifically those aspects of the way the world is now that promotes chronic diseases; and how we might change them. To this end it explored the growing call for action to address barriers to health and the resurgence of community and civil society – the groundswell of influence being brought to bear on government, industry and big business to protect and promote health – and the signs that this is having an impact.

As in 2005, Professors Colagiuri and Leeder, in their role as co-directors of OxHA Asia-Pacific were invited by Senator Guy Barnett’s to assist in the planning of his 2006 National Obesity Forum which was held in the Senate Committee Room of Parliament House, Canberra in October, 2006.

The OxHA Executive Director spoke at the Forum and subsequently met for informal discussion with the Health Minister, the Hon Mr Tony Abbott and members of the bipartisan Parliamentary Diabetes Support Group.