A paper co-authored by Dr Omar Gabriel Torres Valencia argues that political and economic forces shape global health in ways that reform efforts alone cannot overcome.
The BMJ posted to X this week featuring Dr Omar Gabriel Torres Valencia and Daniel Bernal-Serrano, who discuss a recently co-authored academic paper on what the authors call the political economy of global health. The post centres on a single striking line from the conversation: “there is no way that we can out-reform that” — a phrase that points to the paper’s central argument that structural political and economic forces set limits on what health reform can achieve.
The BMJ Podcast hosted the discussion, with the paper available to read via The BMJ’s website. No further details about the paper’s methodology or specific findings are named in the post itself.
The research sits within a broader academic conversation about why health systems — including the NHS — face pressures that go beyond clinical or managerial fixes. But the tweet does not specify which countries or health systems the paper examines, and no Kent-specific data or local health authority response is attached to this publication.
Readers wishing to explore the paper further can visit The BMJ’s website for the full text.
Source: @bmj_latest