Emerging Countries

With a growing presence on the world stage, the BRICS nations—Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa—are expanding their influence and impact worldwide. These countries can address global health issues as they build their own health systems. They are growing in significance, separately as nations and collectively as a center of gravity. They are assuming multiplying roles in global health, including funding, knowledge generation and dissemination, technical assistance and policy advice, empowerment and agency enhancement, advocacy, surveillance and outbreak response, and health system development. Their emerging economies and health systems link them closely to the developing world’s concerns, while their growing economic and political influence draws them into the company of industrialized countries and gives them a more powerful voice in global affairs. Their emergence as global health actors may call more attention to developing countries’ perspectives and needs.