Australia’s New International Development Policy

This submission to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s consultation on Australia’s new International Development Policy advocates for an expanded role, with a greater share of funding, for health and medical research in Australia’s development program. Research Australia notes existing investment in malaria and tuberculosis research through the Health for Development Strategy 2015–20 and illustrates the wider contribution of Australian researchers with member case studies: University of Melbourne studies showing the effectiveness and cost effectiveness of the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine in Fiji; the Deakin University and Fiji National University Pacific Research Centre for the Prevention of Obesity and Noncommunicable Diseases (C-POND), now a World Health Organization Collaborating Centre; the Burnet Institute’s Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies program in Papua New Guinea, where maternal mortality is 80 times that of Australia; and Bond University’s research at Kirakira Hospital in Solomon Islands, which found perinatal mortality double the WHO-reported rate. It maintains that research can strengthen responses to preventable and non-communicable diseases, improve maternal and child health and establish disease prevalence. It recommends helping partner countries build health data infrastructure and encouraging Australian universities to form long-term relationships with specific communities in the region.