FIP CEO Catherine Duggan was among 40 invited leaders, including ministers, leaders of international financing institutions, bilateral and multilateral agencies, private sector investors and health worker organisations, contributing to a roundtable on aligning, stimulating and sustaining health workforce investments for health for all at the 5th Global Forum on Human Resources for Health today. “Whilst it is important for all health professions to have contributed to the unprecedented needs during the COVID-19 pandemic, it is even more important to understand the need to prepare all professions for such emergencies, with investment and remuneration ahead of time (including now as we all face the impact of the pandemic) and the future, so we manage the gap in the health workforce and the health needs we face globally. For pharmacy, we need to be routinely recognised as integral to health care by health ministers and finance ministers alike so that access to medicines is safe and equitable for all,” Dr Duggan told policy leaders and decision makers. Outcomes of the closed discussion were presented at a live broadcast. It was agreed that the health workforce must be recognised as a human capital investment and that the world must now shift to strategic long-term investment and financing. “We have identified a number of concrete ways to stimulate investment now,” said Tana Wuliji of the World Health Organization Health Workforce Department. Proposed investment opportunities generated in this roundtable will inform a WHO-convened health investment forum in June 2023 and the United Nations General Assembly’s High-Level Meeting on Universal Health Coverage in September. Dialogue outcomes will also inform the WHO-ILO-OECD Working for Health Programme and the WHO’s collaboration with global, regional and country stakeholders, international financing institutions and other investors to catalyse workforce investments, particularly towards strengthening primary health care and health security. Accepting spending in health as an investment, not a cost, is crucial. Key now is action, said WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.