The major news story this month is that WHO Europe approved its men's health strategy on 19 September. 

The decision was made at WHO Europe's Regional Committee meeting in Rome. Delegates described the strategy on the health and well-being of men in the WHO European Region, which is based on promoting a gender-sensitive approach to health and human rights, as groundbreaking.

Isabel Yordi Aguirre, Programme Manager for Gender and Health, introduced the discussion by noting that although the 53 countries that comprise the WHO European Region are making progress in reaching the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets related to noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), men are still dying too early. 'None of the data is new to us,' she explained. 'The question is, why is the health sector not reaching these men, why do men smoke more, drink more, drive faster and eat more salt?'

As background information, WHO Europe published a report which:

• Offers an epidemiological overview of men’s health in the Region;
• Examines the intersection between gender, social and economic, cultural, and environmental determinants of men’s health and well-being;
• Improves understanding of how gender norms and roles, and intersections with other determinants of health, influence how health systems respond to men’s health needs;
• Provides evidence of actions needed to engage men in achieving gender equality through readdressing the imbalance of paid and unpaid care, engaging men in preventing 
  violence against women and encouraging shared responsibility for reproductive health;
• Identifies governance mechanisms needed to improve men’s health and well-being, while contributing to gender equality.

The strategy seeks to engage men in accessing services through gender-sensitive approaches. Its main objectives are to:

• Reduce premature mortality among men from NCDs and unintentional and intentional injuries;
• Reduce inequalities in physical and mental health and well-being between men of all ages across the Region and within countries; 
• Improve gender equality by engaging men in self-care, fatherhood, unpaid care, violence prevention, and sexual and reproductive health.

A panel discussion with delegates from Ireland, Portugal and Sweden highlighted key developments in their countries’ work on men’s health. They stressed the importance of strengthening advocacy and partnerships; aligning actions with national priorities; developing a patient-centred approach; considering gender and masculinity as a factor for health; and creating greater awareness of society’s perception of what it means to be a man and father.

In the interventions that followed, Member States and non-State actors supported the resolution and welcomed the adoption of the strategy. The resolution was adopted by consensus.

It was also announced during the discussion that PAHO, the WHO region for the Americas and the Caribbean, is also developing a men's health strategy.

The European men’s strategy complements WHO Europe’s women’s health strategy that was adopted in 2016. GAMH was involved in the consultation process for the strategy and the accompanying report. Our contribution included co-organising a consultative event for civil society stakeholders in Dublin, Ireland in March and publishing a report on the findings.

GAMH is currently discussing with WHO Europe and others the possibility of holding a meeting for civil society organisations to consider how they can use the strategy to press for change in their own countries as well as Europe-wide. 

Commenting on the new strategy, GAMH Director Peter Baker said: ‘This is a landmark day in the history of men’s health in Europe and globally. Although the strategy is not binding on member states, we now want to see firm commitments to action from all of them and we are also calling on the other WHO regions and WHO centrally to develop a similar approach. We will do whatever we can to support implementation and to take full advantage of this opportunity. We thank WHO Europe for involving us in the development of the strategy and for bringing it to fruition.’

• Move beyond equating gender with women. Global, national and local health policy needs to take account of how the roles, behaviours, activities, attributes and opportunities of males and females are based on different levels of power. This understanding of gender as a social and relational construct of power amplifies inequities in health for everyone and intersects with other drivers of inequities.
• Adopt a holistic approach to analysis and action on gender. This approach will intersect with three domains of health: social determinants; health-seeking behaviour; and service delivery and health-system responses, and hence across the 2030 agenda for sustainable development. Applying gender to one of these domains alone will fail to address inequities in health efficiently.
• Invest in more gender analysis of sex-disaggregated data, alongside other stratifiers of social and health inequity. Global health journals should encourage authors to include a gender analysis of sex-disaggregated data, including how the social construction of masculinities and femininities shape men’s and women’s health.
• Acknowledge and act on the gendered nature of the health workforce. Formulate gender-sensitive policies and health professional regulations through all levels of health governance to ensure gender parity, increased leadership roles for women and decent conditions of work for all.
• Break down the isolated policy structures between different government sectors and programme areas and build a broad multi-stakeholder coalition for gender in global health. Such a coalition will aim to transcend narrow disease-focused approaches and engage more with civil society and with policymakers beyond ministries of health.
• Support transparency and accountability mechanisms at the country level. This can be done through strengthening a gendered health focus in voluntary national reviews, United Nations development assistance frameworks, and national health sector plans and programmes, building on the approach developed by Global Health 50/50.