Contributor: Charlotte Owens, MD
To learn more about Charlotte, click here.
Efforts to address societal issues are often initiated after major events, such as the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Yet, after the inspirational moment begins to fade, so do plans for truly transformational change. More often than not, short-term programs don’t move the needle, highlighting the importance of creating long-term, sustainable solutions.
One urgent societal issue that requires such solutions, across all sectors, is health inequity – the unfair and avoidable differences in health status that exist among groups of people and countries. Health inequities are linked to more than an individual’s clinical care. In fact, research confirms that clinical care only contributes to approximately 20% of a person’s overall health; the social determinants of health – the conditions where people live or work, access to education, jobs and resources, racial and cultural factors – contribute to the other 80%. This statistic should not come as a surprise, as health inequities reflect prevalent, persistent, multifactorial barriers to care.
As a physician, I see first-hand that achieving health equity starts with listening to, and understanding, the personalized needs of patients and communities. As a pharmaceutical executive, I believe the industry has the ability to help address health inequities. The potential impacts of health equity go beyond the consideration of building a healthier society: there is strong evidence that addressing health equity can help businesses develop better workplace environments and grow sales, as well as market share.
In January of 2023, the World Economic Forum (WEF) held its annual meeting in Davos, where it convened global leaders from various sectors to discuss the state of the world and priorities for the year ahead. The world’s first global, multi-sector health equity pledge also took place there. As a member of WEF’s Global Health Equity Network representing Takeda, I was proud that our company was among the first of 39 companies to sign the Zero Health Gaps Pledge. We agreed to ten key action commitments to embed health equity in our organization’s business strategy, operations, and investments.
We believe applying health equity principles to our business allows us to deliver innovative medicines and products to more people and communities that need them. We’re taking steps to build a broad network of people, places, and tools that foster sustainable and impactful change at any and every level.
Our Center for Health Equity and Patient Affairs (HEPA) is helping to create an inclusive health ecosystem. HEPA aims to embed health equity considerations throughout our business decisions and work, by serving as a Center of Excellence to all business units. It provides important services, programs, and frameworks that help make it possible for Takeda to build sustainable, physical, and intellectual infrastructures to address health disparities and inequities. Our efforts are intentionally designed to create reciprocal social impact – impact that benefits both the community and patients we serve, as well as our business.
We recognize that health equity isn’t a single, one-off step, or one-size-fits-all box. We know it may feel daunting to address such a significant and pervasive challenge, too. At times, people are convinced health inequities are too big or complex to solve, so why try? Some think it’s an issue that only specially trained people can tackle. Sometimes analysis paralysis sets in, and nothing happens, perhaps out of a concern for not doing it right. Ultimately, we need to be brave enough to move from theory to action because it just might work, like so many other big changes which have been successfully undertaken and changed healthcare in transformational ways.
Lily Zheng, consultant and author of DEI Deconstructed, shared the importance of digging deeper to get to the core of problem-solving: You can’t provide a solution when you don’t understand a problem. We’ve learned achieving health equity starts by listening and learning. We seek to understand diverse patients’ needs, and the communities in which they were born, grow, live, work and age. We can then co-create more inclusive practices and develop innovative medicines that better reflect how patients wish and need to engage with healthcare to help them achieve their highest levels of health.
Holding ourselves accountable is a crucial part of the process – one we don’t take lightly. As we look to promote long-term and future well-being for all, we strive to factor in health equity considerations, including:
- Understanding and embracing that health equity can better society and business throughout your organization. Embedding health equity considerations throughout an organization can help it better understand its stakeholders and meet their needs. This starts with alignment and buy-in from the top, so the organization can see how integrating health equity is a value-add and business framework that can be adapted by all.
- Addressing health inequity isn’t just one person’s or team’s responsibility – it will take all of us, at every level and sector, to achieve. Building like-minded partnerships across sectors can lead to broad, sustainable community benefit – a critical component of advancing health equity. Forming synergistic partnerships inside your organization and externally across sectors enables us to share knowledge and resources to build and strengthen with and in communities. Cross-sector collaboration isn’t competition, but a way to help us achieve shared goals.
- Determining your organization’s area of focus, and providing adequate resources, so your efforts result in maximum impact. Not all organizations can or should do the same work. Different communities will likely require different efforts. Co-creating, adapting, and tailoring solutions that reflect the diverse needs of patients and communities are key to advancing health equity. Consider what structures, frameworks, and findings will provide a ‘win-win’ situation for all.
Looking ahead, embedding health equity principles throughout our work, organizations, and daily lives allows us to build a more equitable, successful, and sustainable future. To have the potential of achieving a world with accessible healthcare for all, we need more inclusive community ecosystems. It starts by addressing the root causes of inequity and moving from theory into action. Bishop Desmond Tutu once said, “There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river; we need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.”
Will you join us upstream?
To contact Charlotte, visit her LinkedIn page.