PAHO/WHO Collaborating Centre Spotlight Series
Dr. Heidi Jimenez, Legal Counsel, is the PAHO staff member who acts as the Region’s focal point to coordinate the collaboration between the institution and the Organization.
The main activities of this Centre include training, education, capacity building and research projects in health law and human rights.
The Centre at O’Neill Institute developed research on the general perspective of the legislation/regulation of alcoholic beverages in Central America and the Hispanic Caribbean, which was presented at PAHO’s “Technical sub-regional workshop on regulatory frameworks on alcohol and health in Central America” in May 2017. The Centre continued to provide technical advice in the 2018 “Commission on Equity and Health Inequalities in the Americas” meeting in Trinidad and Tobago to discuss linkages between human rights and health and proposed recommendations. In 2019, the Centre participated in PAHO’s conference on the “Right to Health in National Courts” during the panel on the “Right to Health from Diverse Perspectives” and also moderated the panel on “Justiciability of social rights and the balance of power between the executive, legislative and judicial branches.”
With respect to capacity building, the Centre provided a lecture in 2018 on the “right to health and the main human rights instruments related to health” as part of PAHO’s first Diplomado Internacional de Legislación en Salud. This event was organized jointly by PAHO, the University of Panama, and the Ministry of Health (Panama). The lecture was attended by 30 national lawyers from different public institutions, judges and scholars. In September 2018, PAHO participated in the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law Colloquium where leading experts in public health gathered in dialogue regarding pressing issues in global health law, policy and governance.
Webnotes such as these serve to inform on how CCs are contributing to the Organization’s priorities and mandates.