Taking action for universal health coverage

The UN High-Level Meeting on UHC 2023

About the UN High-Level Meeting on UHC 2023

The 2023 UN High-level meeting (UN HLM) on universal health coverage (UHC) took place on 21 September 2023. It provided countries and stakeholders an opportunity to reinvigorate progress towards delivering health for all.

Read the summary here

Click here to read the Political Declaration of the High-level Meeting on Universal Health Coverage, “Universal Health coverage: expanding our ambition for health and well-being in a post-COVID world”.

Engage, advocate and participate

Now that world leaders have recommitted to achieving UHC by 2030, it's time to hold them accountable. All partners in the UHC movement, whether government representatives, parliamentarians, academia, civil society or the private sector, must hold countries accountable and ensure that the commitments made at the 2023 UN HLM on UHC are translated into concrete action that advances UHC at the community, regional, national and global levels.

We encourage all partners to use our advocacy tools as a basis for coordinated advocacy efforts. And don't forget to sign up for our newsletter for updates and to visit our UHC Day page to prepare for this year's campaign.

There are many other ways to engage, advocate, and participate in the UHC movement. For information about UHC progress, refer to the UHC Data Portal and the State of UHC Commitment. You can also find additional messaging and resources here.

Action Agenda from the UHC Movement

The Action Agenda from the UHC Movement was drafted by an inclusive, multi-stakeholder Task Force, which brought together twenty representatives from UHC2030 constituencies and beyond. Building on the 2019 Key Asks and commitment areas, it is based on the latest data to address the challenges of the global health context.

The Action Agenda, with action-oriented policy recommendations and concrete milestones, was presented to the President of the UN General Assembly ahead of the 2023 UHC political declaration negotiation.

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UHC2030 and the UN HLM

In September 2019, at the first United Nations High-Level Meeting (UN HLM) on UHC, world leaders endorsed the most ambitious and comprehensive political declaration on health in history. However, according to the latest global monitoring report on universal health coverage, UHC progress is not on track, and the COVID-19 pandemic has brought the world further away from the 2023 targets set by the political declaration:

Progressively covering 1 billion additional people, with a view of covering all people by 2030;
Stopping the rise and reversing the trend of catastrophic out-of-pocket health expenditure and eliminate impoverishment due to health-related expenses by 2030.

UHC2030’s latest State of UHC Commitment Review Key Findings also find that in 2022, progress on UHC has stalled and in some cases has reversed. Accelerating progress towards universal health coverage and delivering on political commitments made in 2019 has never been more urgent. Concrete action is needed to strengthen equitable health systems – including public health functions that are critical for pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.