OPINION: Presidential Campaigns Should Pay More Attention To Global Health As Job Creator

In this post in the Huffington Post’s “Opportunity” blog, Orin Levine, executive director of the International Vaccine Access Center (IVAC), examines “some of the available facts on global health and jobs in swing states and [presents] three reasons why the presidential campaigns should pay more attention to global health than they have so far.” Levine writes, “According to the Duke Global Health Institute, in 2007, global health contributed an estimated 7,000 jobs, more than $500,000,000 in wages and salaries and had an economic impact of $1.7-2.0 billion on the North Carolina economy”; “[n]early one-half of all the funding for global health from [USAID] went to Virginia-based institutions — over $560 million in FY 2011 and 2012 alone,” which “no doubt provide jobs to hundreds of Virginians”; and “U.S. contributions to global health and policies towards regulation, research and investments that build systems in emerging market countries will have a major impact on thousands of jobs” in Pennsylvania, where “Merck, Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline and others have major manufacturing, commercial and research presences” (7/20).

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