Mobilizing a cross-industry coalition to strengthen pandemic preparedness – and forging a new model of public-private partnership

The increasing frequency of global health crises – including COVID-19 – and the failure to prepare adequately have taken a serious health and economic toll on countries around the world. The lack of attention to health security and major gaps in many countries’ health systems highlights the need for multi-sector collaboration to mitigate risk.

An important step toward multi-sector collaboration is effectively integrating the private sector as a true partner with government and multilateral agencies. Rabin Martin identified a need for a cross-industry coalition to provide the private sector perspective on strengthening global health security and leveraging the business communities’ distinct capabilities to support global, regional and national efforts to prevent, detect and respond to emerging health threats.

In collaboration with founding co-chairs Johnson & Johnson and the GE Foundation, Rabin Martin established the Private Sector Roundtable on Global Health Security (PSRT) in 2015. Members are from the health, technology, logistics, energy, and other sectors. As the Secretariat, we are:

• Elevating the visibility of the private sector’s critical role in strengthening health security ​
• Advocating for greater private sector engagement in pandemic prevention and preparedness – not just response
• Building strong relationships with the CDC, World Health Organization, World Bank, Asian Development Bank and other leaders in global health security​​
• Facilitating the efforts of member companies to leverage their expertise in building country and regional capacity to strengthen health system resilience and mitigate health and development risks and vulnerabilities​​
• Contributing the private sector perspective as a Steering Committee member to the Global Health Security Agenda, the leading partnership against global health threats, involving nearly 70 countries