Dr Carolina Haylock-Loor delivered this statement during the WHA79 side event “Pain in Global Health: Strengthening Coordinated Action for Equitable Access to Effective Pain Care”, hosted by the International Association for the Study of Pain and co-sponsored by WFSA.
On behalf of the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to this important discussion.
Pain is everywhere in healthcare.
It runs through almost every aspect of what health systems do — from childbirth to cancer care, from trauma to surgery, from critical illness to palliative care. Pain is present in emergency departments, operating rooms, intensive care units, recovery wards, and community settings alike.
And yet too often, pain management remains fragmented, under-prioritised, and siloed.
If we are serious about strengthening health systems, we must recognise that pain management cannot sit separately from broader health system development. It must be integrated into sustainable perioperative and acute care systems aligned with implementation of the integrated ECO strategy that Lee talked about.
The ECO framework rightly recognises that patients move across a continuum of care. The same is true for pain. Effective pain management requires coordinated systems that connect emergency care, surgery, anaesthesia, critical care, rehabilitation, maternity care, and palliative services.
This is fundamentally a workforce issue.
Without a trained and supported health workforce, equitable pain care is impossible. Pain management must become a core competency across the healthcare workforce, not a specialist afterthought.
Through its Essential Pain Management programme, WFSA has seen how sustainable, context-appropriate training can strengthen frontline workforce capacity and improve patient-centred care.
Ultimately, this is not only a clinical issue. It is a matter of dignity, equity, and human rights.
No person should be left to suffer unnecessarily because of where they live, the resources of their health system, or the absence of trained providers and essential medicines. Access to appropriate pain management should be recognised as an integral component of universal health coverage and of the right to health itself.
At WFSA our members are working for pain management to be embedded within integrated ECO care implementation, national workforce strategies, and broader health system strengthening efforts.
Thank you.
