Addressing NCDs high on Health Ministry’s 2013 agenda

Jan 03, 2013 News

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With a view of better addressing the challenge of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs), the Ministry of Health is looking to expand its delivery of service, particularly in the capital city of Georgetown.
At least this is according to Minister of Health, Dr Bheri Ramsaran, who revealed on Monday that “we are going to be pushing NCDs.”
He was at the time addressing a press conference at the Ministry of Health’s Brickdam, Georgetown headquarters, at which point he disclosed that great focus will be directed to city public health facilities since those accommodate about one quarter of the population. Added to this, he said that there is a strong primary health care network, which is characterised by the more than 10 health centres operated by the Ministry of Health from Industry at Greater Georgetown to Agricola on the East Bank of Demerara.
Some health facilities, he said, are also operated by the Mayor and City Council of Georgetown so “we have the infrastructure and we are going to be doing an analysis…As a matter of fact analysis is ongoing to see what are the gaps we need to address to bring these health centres up to speed to make them points of service that can address the NCDs epidemic,” said the Minister.
This renewed effort which is to be realised this year will see the Ministry focusing on four categories of diseases, among them cardiovascular diseases and hypertension, diabetes, chronic pulmonary diseases and cancers.
During the course of this year, the Minister anticipates that all of the target health facilities and even an additional few will be able to tackle the existing chronic pulmonary diseases trend.
“At these facilities you will have nebulisers so that a child or an adult suffering from pulmonary diseases. For example, an asthma case doesn’t have to go down to the Georgetown (Public) Hospital in all of that furore and terror that happens there…when the child is all uncomfortable and then you have to be fighting in a crowd…”
The measures that the Ministry is poised to engage, Dr Ramsaran said, will be based on World Health Organisation (WHO) standards and on the recommendations of its recently held Assembly, and even more recently, the 28th Regional Sanitary Conference of the Pan American Health Organisation for the Americas.
At those fora, the target disease groups were identified, and according to Minister Ramsaran “the Ministry has been working with an international flavour to address them and nothing is preventing us from doing it. We have the health centres; we have the expanded work force and now I have two of my managers who will come together to see it happen.”

Challenging Threats
Even as the Ministry seeks to address the NCDs, the Minister said that there are four existing threats that must be arrested – abuse of alcohol, tobacco consumption, sedentary lifestyle and improper diet. The latter, will see the Ministry looking at the use of sugary foods, especially sugary beverages among children and fatty foods.
Another component which the Health Ministry has added especially for the local population is that of salt, said the Minister.
“These are some of the things we are putting in our strategy and we want the media to help us project this…the NCDs, and at the same time the threats we are dealing with; threats that tend to reinforce these disease patterns in the population.”
Engaging this strategic move, the Minister said, will entail the launch of a programme being dubbed ‘Wellness Warriors’ which he anticipates will encourage the active support of the media. This programme is expected to see persons whom he described as “community champions” being educated on a mass scale about the categories of NCDs as well as the threats.
“This will ensure that everywhere…under ever leaf and at every corner and on every culvert or curb we have a wellness warrior. At the same time we will be utilising traditional partners who we find that we have not exploited their potential, such as the school system.”
Accordingly, healthy lifestyles will be fully promoted in the school system, said the Minister, even as he amplified that the health sector is very concerned about childhood obesity.  This state of affairs, he explained, has been linked to the food items available at schools’ canteens.
“So we are going to be working with the schools more vigorously and more innovatively, hopefully with the support of the media, to promote it in the schools, the health clubs and what we can call key opinion leaders among the students and pupils, so that they can become our change agents to influence the adult populations at home to fight against NCDs.”

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