Development goals in the post-2015 world: Whither Canada?

A new set of post-2015 development goals for the world is being negotiated. Several potential goals relating to sustainable development, poverty, the economy and health have been identified. Many of them have potential public health gains, although there are inadequacies in how several of them have been defined. In participating in finalization of these goals, Canada should strengthen its commitments to maternal/child health; promote its publicly funded health system as an important model for universal health coverage; incorporate stronger protections for public health in trade and investment treaties; use its foreign aid to help low- and middle-income countries build the transparent and progressive tax systems to mobilize domestic revenues for health; and promote global systems of taxation to prevent tax evasion and illicit capital flight.