GEORGETOWN, Guyana, CMC – The Director of the Pan American Well being Group (PAHO), Dr. Jarbas Barbosa, is concluding a three-day go to to Guyana on Wednesday, which was highlighted by the signing of an settlement designed to supply a coordinated framework for technical cooperation to deal with widespread public well being challenges within the Caribbean.
Barbosa signed the Joint Subregional Cooperation Technique with Caribbean Neighborhood (CARICOM) Secretary-Normal Dr. Carla N. Barnett on Tuesday.
The initiative will cowl Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago, in addition to the 5 affiliate members of CARICOM, particularly Anguilla, Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, and the Turks and Caicos Islands.
“This signing marks a milestone in a long-standing partnership rooted in belief, mutual respect, and a shared imaginative and prescient for the well being and well-being of the peoples of the Caribbean,” mentioned Barbosa.
He mentioned the Caribbean faces distinctive and interconnected public well being challenges, from the rising burden of non-communicable ailments to the continued risk of local weather change, to the necessity for digital transformation and stronger, extra resilient well being techniques.
“These challenges don’t cease at borders, and neither can our options,” the PAHO director added.
Barnett mentioned that this settlement “is a landmark second in our partnership with PAHO, which has been instrumental in focusing our well being insurance policies and our public well being supply, and guaranteeing we will care for the well being of the folks of the group”.
Guyana’s Well being Minister, Dr. Frank Anthony, mentioned, “This technique affirms that well being isn’t just a service, it’s a proper. Within the Caribbean, that proper should not be dictated by the place you reside, by your revenue, or your age.”
PAHO mentioned that the cooperation technique outlines 5 strategic priorities for its technical cooperation within the subregion.
These embrace enhancing the resilience of major well being care-based well being techniques, which hinges on a number of key areas: bolstering evidence-based decision-making, fostering strong workforce insurance policies and coaching for a resilient well being workforce, implementing a complete digital transformation coverage, and guaranteeing widespread entry to high quality, reasonably priced medicines, vaccines, and well being applied sciences.
It is going to additionally search to advance local weather adaptation, mitigation, catastrophe preparedness, and response to reinforce environmental sustainability and well being safety.
PAHO acknowledged that this initiative will deal with local weather emergency preparedness, in addition to the implementation of local weather adaptation methods to reinforce well being sector resilience, and the mixing of environmental well being issues into regional public well being insurance policies and packages.
The technique can be supposed to strengthen multisectoral motion in direction of surveillance, prevention, and management of NCDs, violence, accidents, psychological well being circumstances, and their threat elements.
Inside this space, PAHO and Caribbean nations will collaborate on creating insurance policies to mitigate non-communicable illness (NCD) threat elements. They may even speed up the implementation of NCD administration initiatives, together with PAHO’s Higher Take care of NCDs and cervical most cancers elimination methods. A key focus may even be on expediting the transition to community-based psychological healthcare.”
PAHO acknowledged that it’s advancing the prevention, management, and elimination of precedence communicable ailments by subregional coordination, using the One Well being Strategy.
“This strategic precedence will deal with accelerating the elimination of communicable ailments by the strengthening of insurance policies to advertise vaccination as a public good. It is going to additionally look to reinforce surveillance and early-warning techniques to allow nations to reply shortly to outbreaks of communicable ailments.”
The UN company acknowledged that enhancing technical cooperation by partnerships, useful resource mobilization, and advocacy may even be a part of the technique.
It mentioned this consists of the event of a subregional framework in partnership with CARICOM to reinforce useful resource mobilization, in addition to engagement with decision-makers to deal with precedence well being points.
“As we signal this technique…allow us to additionally renew our dedication to work collectively – not simply as establishments, however as allies, and as a group sure by widespread goal,” mentioned Barbosa, who throughout his go to right here additionally held talks with Guyana’s Prime Minister, Mark Phillips, to debate very important enhancements being made to the well being system.
High of the agenda was the influence of well being employee migration, and the significance of using new know-how, comparable to PAHO’s hybrid nursing packages to develop nurse coaching, significantly for nations of the Caribbean that face comparable points with coaching and retention,” PAHO mentioned.
