C’bean region to boost preparedness against climate-driven health risks

May 02, 2017 News

The Caribbean region is moving one step closer to boosting its capacity to deal with climate-driven

Executive Director of CARPHA, Dr. C. James Hospedales

health risks. This will be made possible through a recent Letter of Agreement signed on to by the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA), on behalf of other CARICOM and non-governmental agencies that represent climate-sensitive sectors in the Caribbean at the Georgetown Marriott Hotel.
CARPHA signed the agreement as it is the leading health partner on the Consortium of Regional Sectoral Early Warning Information Systems Across Climate Timescales (EWISACTs) Coordination Partners. The initiative is being headed by the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH).
At the signing, Principal of CIMH, Dr. David Farrell, who also functions as the Chair and climate services provider for the EWISACTs Consortium, presented the LoA to Executive Director of CARPHA, Dr. C. James Hospedales at the 62nd Annual Health Research Conference held here over the weekend.
According to Dr. Hospedales, CARPHA will work with the CIMH and other partners of the Consortium to co-develop tailored climate early warning products and services that regional health practitioners can use to better prepare for climate-driven health risks, including mosquito-borne diseases such as Dengue, Zika and Chikungunya.
CARPHA is not the first agency to sign on to this agreement. Those entities that preceded it include the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI), the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO), the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA) and the Caribbean Water and Wastewater Association (CWWA).
In his remarks, Dr. Farrell said that the CIMH welcomes the formal inclusion of CARPHA into the Consortium of Regional EWISACTs Coordination Partners which significantly enhance this unique strategic partnership that supports the region’s adaptation to extreme weather, increasing climate variability and climate change.
He said, “Through CARPHA’s participation, a better understanding of how climate directly and indirectly influences regional health will be developed and new joint products and services built to mitigate identified challenges to improve health outcomes leading to a healthier more productive Caribbean.”
This agreement places the Caribbean region in the position to be the first region globally to officially create and implement a joint commitment between climate-sensitive sectors and a climate services provider geared towards building climate resiliency.
The partnership was made possible through support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID)’s Programme for Building Regional Climate Capacity in the Caribbean (BRCCC Programme).
The CARPHA conference was officially launched last Thursday (April 27) and concluded on Saturday. One of the key issues addressed was the gaps which exist in the Caribbean regarding Human Health Research in accordance with the Agency’s mission.
It was highlighted that in some CARICOM countries, there are outdated Human Subject Research Legislation, and in some cases there are none.
Delivering the feature address at that event was Minister within the Ministry of Public Health, Dr. Karen Cummings, who said that both the environment and the human resource are susceptible to the spread of infectious diseases that are predicted to occur as a result of climate change. She said that in Guyana, her administration has been vigorously pursuing avenues to advance responses that will mitigate the effects of climate change and protect the environment and Guyanese.
“Using a top-down formula commencing at the governmental level and filtering to every aspect of our various communities, we have to pool our resources and expertise to devise and implement measures to heighten awareness on the effects of climate change.”
The Minister added that given the urgency to find solutions to address these global issues, the CARPHA conference was timely; presenting an opportunity for attention to be placed on scientific evidence that has already been generated, so that experts can assess the health risks of climate change and the most effective interventions to manage those risks.

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