"HEALTH FOR ALL" SHOULD NOT BE AN UNATTAINABLE UTOPIA

VATICAN CITY, MAY 31, 1999 (VIS) - On May 19, Archbishop Javier Lozano Barragan, president of the Pontifical Council for Pastoral Assistance to Health Workers, participated in the 52nd session of the World Assembly of the World Health Organization (WHO) which took place in Geneva, Switzerland from May 17 to 26.

In his speech, which was published today, the head of the Holy See delegation said: "For the ideal of 'health for all' - including a minimum universal health assistance - not to remain an unattainable utopia, inspiring concepts and the practical operational criteria of solidarity, which may effectively ensure that profit and market forces not be absolute parameters, must be incorporated into the ideas and action of the world economy. Only in this way can health, especially of the poorest and most defenseless, take its rightful place."

He went on: "The Holy See would like to use this occasion to reiterate its constant appeal to the international community not to allow the opportunity offered by the close of the second millennium to pass without resolving the grave problem of the external debt of the poorest countries. ... This urgent requirement cannot but concern all those responsible for world economy and politics."

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