Commission on Macroeconomics and Health.

of Norway, chaired the World Commission on Environment and Development, also known as the Brundtland Commission.The work of this Commission, and of the UN Conference on Environment and Development, held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, moved environmental concerns to centre stage in debates concerning macroeconomic policy and development.On becoming Director-General of WHO in 1998, Dr Brundtland was inspired to do for health what she had previously helped to achieve for the environment, and in January 2000 set up the Commission on Macroeconomics and Health.It had a two-year mandate to debate, research, and reach conclusions about the role of health in economic development.Its report, published on 20 December 2001, has received much attention in the media and is now being widely circulated (1).The Commission consisted of eighteen commissioners, a four of whom, including myself, came from the health sector and were relatively unimportant -unimportant, because our views on the importance of health and its close relationship to economic well-being and stability are already well known.We are seen as ''special pleaders'' for greater investment in health.The excitement and the power of the Commission derives instead from the other fourteen Commissionersindividuals who are prominent in economics, finance, development, trade, and political leadership.Their views on