Presentation delivered in the subplenary "Looking to the next generation of health activists" during the Third People's Health Assembly, July 10, 2012, Cape Town, South Africa

1. Medical Students
as Determinants of Health
The Role of IFMSA in Global Health Equity
Ramon Lorenzo Luis Rosa Guinto, MD
Regional Coordinator for the Asia-Pacific
Founding Coordinator, Global Health Equity Initiative
International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations (IFMSA)
Third People’s Health Assembly, July 10, 2012, University of the Western Cape

2. • An independent, non-governmental and non-political
federation of medical students' associations throughout
the world
• Founded in May 1951
• 108 National Member Organizations
• 101 countries in six continents
• More than 1 million medical students worldwide
• Recognized by WHO and United Nations

3. Mission
Our mission is to offer future physicians a
comprehensive introduction to global health
issues. Through our programming and
opportunities, we develop culturally sensitive
students of medicine, intent on influencing the
transnational inequalities that shape the health
of our planet.

4. Picture of Presidents in
Jakarta MM2011

6. IFMSA Small Working Group on
Health Inequities

10. Country Initiatives
• Georgia • United Kingdom
• Uganda • Philippines
• Quebec • Norway
• Peru • Taiwan

15. IFMSA Global Health
Equity Initiative
• Institutional voice for global
health equity within IFMSA
• Accessible clearinghouse of
information and capacity-
building tools
• Dynamic forum for exchange
and dialogue
• Key platform for advocacy
and campaign for global health
equity

19. Next Steps
• Lancet - University of Oslo Commission on Global
Governance for Health
• Third People’s Health Assembly in Cape Town, July 6-11,
2012
• August Meeting 2012 in
Mumbai, India –
“Universal Health Care –
The Time is Now!”

20. Transformative scale-up of medical
education – integrate SDH thinking

21. The 21st century physician as champion
of social determinants approach to health

22. “The doctor of the
future will give no
medicine, but will
interest his patients in
the care of the human
frame, in diet, and in
the cause and
prevention of disease.”
Thomas Alva Edison

23. The Power of Medicine
"Medicine… has the
obligation to point out
problems and to attempt
their theoretical
solution…The physicians
are the natural attorneys
of the poor…”
Dr. Rudolf Virchow
Father of Social Medicine

24. The Power of Young People
“The youth are
the hope of the
Fatherland.”
Dr. Jose Rizal
National Hero of the Philippines

25. Fathers of Social Medicine

26. Health for All!
Alma Ata, USSR, 1978 Almaty, Kazakhstan, 2008
Thank You Very Much!