摘要：Advocacy and lobbying are more taking an ever more central place in health agendas of African countries. It is impossible to have a conversation about public policy these days without someone mentioning 'civil society'. Unfortunately, clarity and rigor are conspicuously absent within civil society. Advocacy and lobbying for enforcement of health policy is called for because of civil society's tendency to concentrate on commercial interests rather than health equity. A States' first duty towards citizens is to respect the right to health by refraining from adopting laws or measures that directly impinge on people's health. There is evidence from the literature of civil society organization (CSO) intervention in support of primary health care, equity in health and state health services. Our desk review yields 38 online documents. Information obtained from the desk review is analyzed vis a vis interviews from visits to three selected key informants who are a government official involved in health policy formulation at the ministry of health and two civil society organizations officials from the health NGO network. Key themes emerging from our consultations are discussed during the 27Th annual scientific conference hosted by the Tanzania Public health association at St. Gasper conference centre, Dodoma, Tanzania 2-6,th November 2009. From a PowerPoint "oral" presentation participant's queries are input. Based on our interpolation of the civil society consensus articulated at the Tanzania Conference we establish that the centrality of a right to health framework is an important basis for policy. Our interviews establish that countries should ensure that public health principles and priorities are clear and legally binding; countries should have a clear coordinating mechanism on issues of trade and health that involve government, particularly health ministries and civil society. Civil society needs to disseminate health and trade information in assessable ways. Challenges faced by lobbyists are foreign funding for capacity building initiatives and availability of technical expertise to inform the policy making process adequately.
