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ASHLEY HALL: It's estimated that every day 1500 women die in childbirth or because of complications during pregnancy.

And health experts claim that most of those deaths could be avoided if better health care was available in developing countries.

Today at the UN headquarters the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has made a down payment on reducing the number of deaths.

He launched a program to bring free health care to at least 10 million people in six developing nations and said the world should be shamed into doing something about the nine million children under the age of five who die each year from treatable diseases.

Professor Lawrence Gostin is the director of the Center for Law and the Public's Health at Johns Hopkins and Georgetown Universities, as well as consultant to the World Health Organization.

He says Mr Brown's aid plan is a good first step towards improving global health care but what's really needed is a global convention on health.

Professor Gostin spoke to me earlier from Melbourne where he is a distinguished visiting fellow at the Melbourne Law School.

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: This is a problem that's no less important than climate change.

And so what it would entail is a global governance system that sets priorities and coordinates activities.

ASHLEY HALL: Don't we already have a body like that - the World Health Organization?

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Well unfortunately the World Health Organization has not acted the way it was supposed to.

It is a wonderful technical organisation. It clearly should be, actually must be a global leader in health but the international community has just never let it be that and there is a crisis of leadership through no fault of its own but because of the lack of support.

ASHLEY HALL: So would you see the WHO morphing into a new body or is it time to replace it altogether with a brand spanking new machine?

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: No I would certainly keep the World Health Organization. It is the very first UN agency after the World War II and it was blessed with many important powers.

So what I would do is I would start to support the World Health Organization, give it some teeth. This framework convention on global health would do just that and because at the moment it is floundering.

If you notice almost every international global health initiative circumvents the World Health Organization. Whether it's the global fund for TB, malaria and tuberculosis or the GAVI Alliance for vaccines or even Gordon Brown's new initiative for women and children, much of it is really going around the WHO rather than through it.

ASHLEY HALL: So are you suggesting a new framework to coordinate all of these efforts?

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Absolutely - to coordinate them, to set priorities, to set funding limits, to make sure that really every country, every NGO, every funder doesn't just follow their own pet project which is usually disease specific.

And basically what we've done is ignore what we really understand to be absolutely necessary for world health and that is what I call basic survival needs.

It's not rich countries parachuting in to rescue the poor with high technology. It's really basic needs; to let poor countries do for themselves what they need to do - basic sewerage, hygiene, electricity, clean food, clean water, vector control, essential drugs and medicines. These are the kinds of things that are desperately needed. Simple to do but we just don't have the global political will to do it.

ASHLEY HALL: So how would we make that happen?

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Just as everyone recognises that we need some kind of a global treaty for climate change, I believe we need some kind of a global treaty for world health.

And this treaty would be one that would set the broad principles and it would engage a wide variety of stakeholders - international organisations like WHO and the World Bank, also individual countries, funders like the Gates Foundation, GAVI Alliance, the Global Fund as well as non-governmental organisations that are providing services on the ground.

We just can't have these fragmented inconsistent efforts that really don't go to the heart of the problem.

ASHLEY HALL: How do you convince wealthier countries to sign up to a compact like this?

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Well that's the critical question. That is the key question and they are very resistant to giving up their sovereignty and they are also very resistant to really committing themselves to certain spending levels or to set certain priorities.

ASHLEY HALL: I mean, similar to climate change, we are looking at a reasonable transfer of wealth here from the developed to the developing countries, aren't we?

LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Precisely and that's what makes it so hard. That's what makes it extremely hard.

I think we have to appeal to two things. One thing is we have to appeal to the self-interest of countries because it is very clear that health doesn't know any geographical/political boundaries.

There is also the question of global health diplomacy. I think that the foreign assistance programs for the Rudd Government, the Obama Government and many others would benefit from providing health assistance in ways that really are quite remarkable.

And then finally the humanitarian instincts that are in us all. We understand that it is deeply unconscionable that the poor live such short and miserable lives compared to the rich.

ASHLEY HALL: Professor Lawrence Gostin.

And you'll find a longer interview with Professor Gostin on The World Today's web site later this afternoon.

©2009 ABC