Sepsis Dialogue at the UNITE Parliamentarians Global Summit

UNITE Parliamentarians Network for Global Health convened its 4th edition of the UNITE Global Summit on October 16, 2024, in Berlin on the margins of the World Health Summit. The Summit was attended by current and former legislators from across the globe and key global health players and leaders from WHO, the Global Fund, GAVI, the World Health Summit, and other stakeholders. 

Within the scope of the Memorandum of Understanding signed by the UNITE Parliamentarians Network for Global Health and the Global Sepsis Alliance, a special Parliamentary Inquiry Session was dedicated to the discussions on Sepsis and AMR.

The Global Sepsis Alliance delegation to the UNITE Global Summit included Prof. Konrad Reinhart – Founding President, Dr. Mariam Jashi – CEO, Marvin Zick – General Manager, Simone Mancini – Coordinator of Regional Sepsis Alliances and Katja Couball – Communication Manager. 

The Sepsis and AMR Session at the UNITE Summit was moderated by Hon. Amar Patnaik, UNITE Global Board Member and Chapter Chair for India. Speakers included Dr. Mariam Jashi, CEO of the Global Sepsis Alliance and former Member of Parliament of Georgia, and Deepali Patel, Director of the AMR Action Fund. 

The following legislators participated in the panel discussions: 

  • Hon. Sobita Gautam - the youngest elected Parliamentarian of Nepal and the 2023 One Young World Politician of the Year Award winner

  • Hon. Sonia Sidhu - Member of Parliament of Canada and Chair of the All-Party Diabetes Caucus.

  • Hon. Valentina Buliga - former Minister of Labour, Social Protection and Family and Member of Parliament of Moldova

  • Hon. Claudio Marte González - politician and diplomat from the Dominican Republic 

  • Hon. Allal Amraoui - member of the European Network of Parliamentarians for a Healthy Environment and a renowned surgeon and accomplished politician of Morocco.

  • Hon. Benson Phiri - Member of Parliament of Malawi and President of the Eastern and Southern African Parliamentary Caucus on SRHR Population and Sustainable Development.

Dr. Mariam Jashi presented the recently launched 2030 Global Agenda for Sepsis at the session and highlighted the critical links of Sepsis and AMR.

She addressed the Parliamentarians and the audience with three main questions: 

  1.  How can we continue to live in a world where up to 50 million children and adults are affected by Sepsis each year, yet fail to prioritize it in every political dialogue and global health forum? Dr. Jashi presented the human, societal and economic arguments, why Sepsis should be mainstreamed in the high-level political dialogue and global health architecture.

  2. While we applaud the historic progress made in AMR advocacy as a global health threat, how can we continue to discuss AMR in isolation without acknowledging Sepsis, when 4.95 million AMR-related deaths are part of 13.66 million Sepsis-related deaths?

  3.  How can we continue to overlook Sepsis in the Global Health and Development Architecture when it is linked to 9 Sustainable Development Goals? Dr. Jashi reiterated that Sepsis affects 50 million people every year, including 20 million children and 5.7 million pregnant women, and is fueled by poverty, malnutrition, pandemics, gender inequality, humanitarian crises, climate change, and other disparities and emergencies.

The Session discussions covered the plan of the Global Sepsis Alliance to establish a High-Level Political Panel for Sepsis and the ways how politicians, members of legislative and executive branches of government, can facilitate strengthening of the Sepsis response at national, regional, and global levels.

We hereby express sincere gratitude to the UNITE Parliamentarians Network for Global Health and its Founding President Dr. Ricardo Baptista Leite for our ongoing and successful collaboration, and critical support in launching the 2030 Global Agenda for Sepsis at the German Bundestag in September 2024.  

Katja Couball