Peaceful societies through health equity and gender equality

Communities and countries around the globe face multiple and overlapping crises fuelled by mounting social, political, and economic pressures. Global leadership and governance structures are failing to address these pressures, with the consequences of this failure most deeply felt in fragile and conflict-affected settings.  Progress on many of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including on SDG 3 (health) and SDG 5 (gender equality) has stalled or reversed.  A new report launched by The Lancet Commission on Peaceful Societies through Health Equity and Gender Equality illustrates how improvements in health equity and gender equality transform societies, placing them on pathways to enduring peace.

Improvements to health equity and gender equality can catalyse change in economic systems, social systems, and governance, prompting societies out of harmful cycles and into beneficial ones. In this interconnected world, the influences of these beneficial cycles can aggregate over time and become global in scope.

Go to the report