The Virchow Prize: cementing commodification, coloniality and biomedical reductionism in global health?

• Published in: BMJ global health Vol. 8; no. 5; p. e011240
• Main Authors: Holst, Jens, Tinnemann, Peter, van de Pas, Remco
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England BMJ Publishing Group Ltd 01.05.2023; BMJ Publishing Group LTD; BMJ Publishing Group
• Subjects: 19th century; Acquired immune deficiency syndrome; AIDS; Awards & honors; Commentary; Commodification; Coronaviruses; COVID-19; Epidemiology; Epistemology; Global Health; Health policy; HIV; Human immunodeficiency virus; Humans; Interdisciplinary aspects; Medicine; Nobility; Pharmaceutical industry; Politics; Public Health; Reductionism; United States > US; Germany; Public Health; Health policy
• DOI: 10.1136/bmjgh-2022-011240
• ISSN: 2059-7908

[...]his leadership has enabled the iteration of Call to Action for an African New Public Health order by the African Union in September 2022.6 His personal commitment to the systemic is further emphasised by his donation of the prize money to the work of the African Field Epidemiology Network (AFENET), an alliance of field epidemiology and laboratory training programmes headquartered in Uganda. The founding members of the Virchow Foundation are key persons within the German private health industry, including pharmaceutical manufacturers that vigorously defend their patents and hinder not only global access to life-saving COVID-19 vaccines but also essential medicines.10 One of the driving forces of the Virchow Foundation is the ‘Global Health Alliance’ which refers to itself as ‘The international voice of German health’.11 But it is essentially a lobbying organisation of the Federation of German Industries (BDI), and its engagement in the German global health arena is strongly focused on the business interests of the national health industry, favouring return on investment, free trade and economic growth over the environment, human rights and participation.12 In any case, the BDI’s core industry and business interests represent only one singular aspect of global health, far from supporting systemic or even broad interdisciplinary solutions.13 Instead, it stands for the colonial mindset dominating global health policies and practices driven by actors from the Global North.14 The industry and the business interests behind the Virchow Prize support a global health paradigm that promotes entrepreneurial investment models, technical innovations and ultimately biomedical reductionism.15 Hence, it was not just the laureate speeches and framings during the award ceremony held in Berlin that might have made the sociopolitical spirit of Virchow turn over in his nearby grave. During the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 1980s, Springer media were engaged in the defamation of the homosexual community; today they belong to the avant-garde of sensationalist populist reporting with open xenophobic tendencies, contributing systematically to a societal divide and polarisation.17 Today’s world does not need more bluewashing by industries that continue to maximise profits, via a coloniality mindset, at the expense of public health needs in the Global South.18 Nor should global health policies and practices be captured as an approach for opening new markets for Germany’s, or another Global North country’s export industry. Virchow believed in social reform to achieve a constitutional democracy by reducing the power of the monarchy and the nobility.19 A consistent translation of Virchow’s writings into today’s reality would ultimately suggest reducing the power of the financial aristocracy and its philanthropic organisations, such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Wellcome Trust, which dominate today’s global health policy and practice, including through their funding of the WHO.20 In the tradition of Rudolf Virchow, any foundation using his name should safeguard his legacy.