Founded in 1863 by a group of concerned citizens to help preserve the nation, The Union League Club of New York has built, over ensuing years, a record of distinguished service to our country. Members of The Union League Club were instrumental in establishing The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1870 as well as the Sanitary Commission, a predecessor organization to the American Red Cross. It helped erect the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor and the Lincoln Monument in Union Square. Its members were instrumental in bringing down the "Boss" Tweed ring and in raising funds to outfit American soldiers in several conflicts.

Many prominent civic, state and national leaders have enjoyed the fellowship of the ULC. Theodore Roosevelt managed his early political career from the Club's chambers. J. Pierpont Morgan was a regular, along with John Jay, William Cullen Bryant, Chester A. Arthur, and Thomas Nast. Fifteen Presidents, seven Senators, many Congressmen, diplomats, cabinet members, and scores of CEOs of major corporations have been members of the Club during the past hundred and fifty years.

CBD has become quite topical over the last ten years, and now more than ever the mainstream adoption is gaining momentum, but why? Erba Verde Group is proud to present a round table discussion to provide an academically and honest exploration of the science of CBD, the non-euphoric cannabis component that has changed the national discussion about industrial hemp in the United States and abroad. Discussion will cover the short and long term effects of CBD; the history of CBD and hemp; the known medicinal qualities and ailments it effectively treats; and what the next steps are to bring CBD forward as a natural medicine to the nations around the world.

In addition to medical CBD, other aspects of hemp will be covered from economic and environmental issues; the overall impact hemp can have in emerging nations ranging from textiles to poured hemp-crete; and, 3D printed hemp-crete buildings, roads, and bridges. Textiles, clothing, paper, and hundreds of other products can be derived from hemp. All that remains is to tap this fast growing, environmentally friendly, versatile plant and we can rapidly accelerate the development of the emerging nations of the world

Dr. James E. Shmerling, DHA, FACHE
President and Chief Executive Officer
Connecticut Children's Medical Center
USA

Children represent 25% of the U.S. population and 100% of our future. Despite being 80 million strong in presence and importance, the leadership in providing specialized care, education, and research for children is concentrated in only 1% of U.S. hospitals: our children’s hospitals.

Children’s hospitals contribute the highest levels of community benefit in support of children, their families and the greater community. This relevant and timely discussion between three Titans in the pediatric healthcare sector will center on the unique--and largely unknown--ways in which children’s hospitals are making progress towards a healthier world.

Vice Admiral Walter Davis
Co-Founder,
Vice President,
Organizational Development,
EvoNexus,
USA

Countries around the world are investing heavily in developing industry focused and concentrated centers of business and technology development. From Medical Cities to Software Parks, these industry focused centers provide a foundation for companies to establish and grow. Many of these centers are created in partnership with major American education and research institutions. But the challenge of industry leading innovation remains difficult to accomplish.

While many countries have very strong research investments and infrastructures, the United States is the world leader in innovation. It is American innovation that shapes the modern world from medicine to the internet to computer science to transportation. America produces more innovators that transform the world than any other country. Yet, this is done without centralized focus on industry centers and business parks.

This roundtable brings together American innovators who have and are developing world changing technologies, including the co-founder of one of the leading technology incubators in Southern California. The Round Table will discuss what are the key aspects that give America its innovative edge and how they have successfully utilized those aspects.

Mr. Michael W. Brown, MHA
President and Chief Executive Officer,
MD Anderson Services Corporation,
MD Anderson Physicians Network,
USA

Accelerating and improving the treatment of cancer patients has become a critical focus of US-based and international health care systems. Due to the fragmented nature of oncology care delivery, novel solutions that incorporate diverse provider, payer and system-level integration are emerging in many health care markets. This session will focus on the ecosystem of oncology-driven partnerships and collaborations, with attention to patient, provider and payer challenges in achieving success in this arena.

Mr. Ransel N. Potter,
Founder & Managing Partner,
C3 Summit International,
USA

Ms. Cynthia Gonzalez,
Executive Director,
International Patient Services,
Cook Children's Healthcare System,
USA

Bring Life to Cook

View Full Size

Aging and growing populations, greater prevalence of chronic diseases, exponential advances in innovative, and costly, new digital technologies continue to increase healthcare demand and expenditures. Healthcare stakeholders—providers, governments, payers, consumers, and other companies/organizations—struggling to manage clinical, operational, and financial challenges-envision a future in which new business and care delivery models, aided by digital technologies, may help to solve today’s problems and to build a sustainable foundation for affordable, accessible, high-quality healthcare. This vision may have a greater probability of becoming a reality if all stakeholders actively participate in shaping the future by way of shifting focus away from system of sick care in which we treat patients after they fall ill, to one of healthcare which supports well-being, prevention, and early intervention.

This 2019 C3 US-Arab Healthcare & Business Summit tackles the current state of the global healthcare sector and explores trends and issues impacting healthcare providers, governments, payers, patients, and other stakeholders. It also provides suggestions for them as they seek to redefine the healthcare ecosystem based on examples from the market.

Simply stated, the 2019 C3 US-Arab Healthcare & Business Summit is about exploring ideas, suggestions, and realistic recommendations as possible solutions to today's bilateral security, technology, commercial development and healthcare challenges. Based on the insights of the Summit's global leaders and thinkers, on the importance of moving healthcare, commerce and philanthropy beyond bilateral borders, participants can begin to immediately implement what they will hear and learn to help bring these innovations, pilot projects, cases studies, public-private partnerships and other practical solutions to fruition in the global commercial and healthcare sectors.

Overall, two billion people are now overweight worldwide. With nearly 130 million at risk, aged between 5 and 19, the largest number of obese children appeared in East Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, and high-income English-speaking countries. These facts highlight, remind and reinforce that obesity is a global health crisis today, and threatens to worsen in coming years, unless we start taking drastic action. In order to reduce child and adolescent obesity, countries should aim to reduce consumption of cheap, ultra-processed, calorie-dense, nutrient-poor foods.

Precision medicine is bridging the worlds of medicine and informatics, integrating patient data to fundamentally change healthcare delivery. The most notable focus to date of precision medicine has been understanding changes in genomics that initiate or drive cancer to target those mutations during treatment. The applications are much broader, however, extending to patients with cardiac disorders, neurologic disease, and a range of other diseases. Previously, much of the data clinicians collected was evaluated in silos. Precision medicine is integrating this data, bridging the worlds of medicine and informatics. By developing artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms that combine and analyze numerous data sources—genomic, imaging, pathology, ECG, family history —care can be more efficient and effective for individual patients. Then, over time, entire patient populations, as a knowledge base, can be created. Both Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Mayo Clinic have already implemented deep genomic sequencing of patients with cancer and conditions in which genes play a key role. These include certain types of cardiovascular disease, pulmonary fibrosis, inflammatory bowel disease, and susceptibility to nosocomial infection by Clostridium difficile. The evolution and broadening of precision medicine and its application to many common conditions represents a new strategy in patient care.

At Brigham Health, and its parent organization Partners HealthCare, clinicians, health informatics specialists, and others are working together with industry experts to unlock the full potential of AI. For example, in February 2019, IBM Watson Health announced a 10-year, $50 million investment in research collaborations with Brigham and Women's Hospital and Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The goal is to improve utility of electronic health records and claims data to address significant public health issues, including patient safety and health equity.

Given the economic and political importance of trade between countries, globalization will continue to impact the stability and potential for healthcare expansion through its influences on improving patient care. As the U.A.E. and other Gulf countries aim to send fewer patients abroad because of the rise in overall healthcare costs, the US healthcare sector will have to rethink the design of its infrastructure and its international relationships with existing and potential partners on the way it can collaborate and provide healthcare services.

Moreover, artificial intelligence will significantly impact this collaboration and present new challenges and opportunities in the future.

The objectives of this panel are:
1. To discuss present and future models of collaboration between US and U.A.E. healthcare institutions.
2. To discuss how US healthcare providers can participate in the success of the U.A.E.’s National Artificial Intelligence Strategy 2031 as it relates to healthcare.
3. To discuss how US healthcare providers can help contain rising healthcare costs in the U.A.E. and the broader Gulf region.

Tremendous advancements are being made that have the ability to transform the lives of patients.  These advancements are especially essential in the areas of cancer, cardiovascular, and patient recovery, as these three make up a large portion of global healthcare expenditure and mortality.  Unfortunately, the majority of these solutions are not cost-effective and cannot be deployed efficiently around the world.  Their effectiveness is limited by the number of patients who can access, and countries that can deploy, these advances.

During this session we are going to discuss how advanced healthcare technology and solutions can be developed from a global perspective.  We will provide real-world examples of next-generation technologies and solutions that are under development and expected to be on the market soon.   Leaders from Fortune 50 healthcare technology companies and leading Silicon Valley based life science companies will share their thoughts on how to achieve these cost-effective global healthcare transformations.  These industry leaders will also share the latest and most promising efforts they are currently involved in, and provide practical insight into creating a sustainable environment that allows any individual, company, country to utilize and achieve dramatic results.

Mr. Ransel N. Potter,
Founder & Managing Partner,
C3 Summit International,
USA

Mr. Mick Merritt,
Chief Operating Officer,
Penn Signature Services,
Penn Medicine,
USA

Ambassador Salah Sarhan,
Chief Representative,
League of Arab States Mission,
Washington, DC,
USA

H.E. Shaikh Abdulla Bin Rashid Al Khalifa,
Ambassador U.S. Embassy,
Kingdom of Bahrain

H.E. Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani,
Secretary-General,
Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC),
Kingdom of Bahrain
Keynote Speaker

The Impact of Healthcare Diplomacy on Foreign Policy

Healthcare providers are stressing rigorous financial management, efficient operational performance, outcomes-based care, and innovative solutions development. These could result in improved care provision, reduced costs, counter declining margins, and align cost structure and care models with reimbursement trends and payment models. Developing public-private partnerships, investing in prevention and well-being, and learning from industries outside of healthcare will also be key.

Global cancer rates continue to increase in certain geographies and for certain cancer types, and addressing these trends remains a critical challenge worldwide. Access to basic screening and prevention services, complex oncological care and novel therapeutic modalities is limited in many regions. By bringing together innovative solutions through population health and public policy approaches, coupled with health care system collaborations, there are substantial opportunities to transfer knowledge across the various dimensions of cancer care. This session will focus on mission-based approaches to expanding services through unique programs that are focused on cancer prevention, screening, diagnosis and treatments.

The world is experiencing the worst humanitarian crisis since WWII. The conflict in Syria has displaced some 3 million people - more than a million Syrian refugees are in Lebanon alone. More than 700,000 Rohingya have taken refugee in Bangladesh, while state failure in Venezuela has dispersed more than 3 million migrants to neighboring countries. In Yemen, the grinding conflict there has left nearly half the population on the brink of famine.

To address these crises, the international community will spend $30B in humanitarian aid this year. In the past, almost all humanitarian aid was delivered as in-kind assistance: food (often surplus commodities), clothing and shelter - shipped across oceans at enormous expense, depressing local markets once delivered, and providing inflexible, one-size-fits-all, often unwanted responses to people in need. In recent years, humanitarian actors have begun to recognize that cash transfers are a far more efficient and effective way to respond, eliminating expensive supply chains and layers of overhead, and putting choice in the hands of recipients. The multiplier effect of direct cash transfers, estimated as much as 2.5 times the transfer itself, also stimulates local markets, reducing the burden on host communities who themselves are often living in difficult circumstances. This panel will discuss the use of cash transfers in the Middle East to address the region's various humanitarian crises.

Although autism-specific statistics on the Middle East are lacking, WHO estimates place the 12-month prevalence of mental disorders for the region between 11-40 percent, well above the global average of 4.3-26.4 percent. The WHO further estimates that the global median rate of autism prevalence has been estimated at 62 per 10,000, although some studies have placed it substantially higher. And for the Middle East, it may be an even bigger concern. To compound the problem for the Middle East, there is no legal recognition of autism-that means no military exemptions, no legal right for special needs children to be in schools, and no legal support.

Also, according to a regional adviser for WHO's Eastern Mediterranean offices "Rates of mental disorder are significantly higher in countries with complex emergencies." For this reason, autism is one of many mental disorders that can be affected by living in a volatile environment-which is the case in much of the Middle East. Available scientific evidence suggests that various factors, both genetic and environmental, contribute to the onset of autism spectrum disorders by influencing early brain development. This panel will discuss a possible breakthrough in treating autism with an ingredient indigenous to the Middle East region: camel's milk! Come learn how this amazing discovery may be a partial answer to stemming the rise of autism in the Middle East...and the world!

Princess Dina Mired of Jordan,
President,
Union for International Cancer Control (UICC),
Jordan

Ms. Doreen Bogdan-Martin,
Director,
International Telecommunication Union,
Telecommunication Development Bureau (BDT),
USA

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines health technology as “the application of organized knowledge and skills in the form of devices, medicines, vaccines and procedures developed to solve a health problem and improve quality of lives”. This includes computer-supported information systems. Health tech is now a multi-billion dollar industry that is rapidly changing the way we handle medicine.

Women dominate healthcare, with 90% the primary healthcare decision makers for their households. That’s an estimated 3.73 billion women who need access to the most effective healthcare solutions for themselves and their families. But there is a gap in providing women with adequate healthcare. This panel will address whether and how technology and digital solutions can provide the needed support to women, including health promotion, prevention, treatment, rehabilitation, and palliative care.

• Women, Health and Technology, where are we in 2019 and how do we want the future to look, considering UHC as a main theme?
• The roles and relationships of healthcare stakeholders, technology & digital players, policy-makers, media, the private sector and civil society in empowering more innovations in Women’s Health Technology innovations

The Middle East and North African (MENA) pharmaceutical market offers significant growth strategies for both innovative and generic players, with the potential driven by rapid population growth, expanding health-insurance coverage and changing disease burdens. The market is expected to reach a value of USD 50 billion by 2025 driven by the private sector in value, spurred by innovator products and the prevalence of brand perception in the region, and in volume by the public sector, which utilizes large government tenders. The government policies are leaning towards the promotion of the pharmaceutical investment environment, although still favoring local manufacturers.

For the immediate-to-medium term growth opportunities, originator drugs should continue to have a strong hold over the market, although they should be taken into consideration with the possible pitfalls such as cost-containment initiatives, alignment of incentives and regulations to promote the use of generics and protectionist legislation. To unlock the full market opportunity, domestic players shall turn market challenges into opportunities with, for example, expanding mutually beneficial partnerships with global players. On the other hand, multinational pharmaceutical companies have an edge mainly through their in-depth technical know-how, advanced R&D capabilities, substantial brand equity, as well as economies of scale. Ultimately, the best positioned players will be those who understand their respective strengths and weaknesses and possess the strategic agility to navigate the changing landscape accordingly.

Welcoming Remarks:

Dr. Mark A. Davis MD, MS
Vice President,
Brigham Health International;
Executive Director,
Business Development and Strategic Initiatives,
Brigham Health;
Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine,
Harvard Medical School,
USA

Music By
Mr. Ruben Allen, Pianist