Health summit opens in Accra

Accra, April. 22, GNA - Health Minister Major Courage Quashigah (Rtd) on Tuesday said the nation was better poised to wage limited war against the over whelming disease burden that has plagued the nation.

"To wage a total war against the enemy 'disease' we need to mobilise ourselves to collectively address the multi-sectoral action for health" Speaking at the opening of the 23rd Health Summit in Accra he said there was the urgent need to commission a full research into the cause of all disease to have a clear picture of what the nation was losing to ill-health.

This, he said, would help to inform the ministry on how to initiate a multi-sectoral planning that would help save at least some proportion of huge sums of money spent on preventable diseases.

The summit aims at reviewing accomplishment and shaping the agenda for the rest of the year and beyond. The recent exercise conducted to determine the cost of malaria burden came up to about 762 million dollars a year he said and noted "this is a frightening eye opener".

He noted that when he assumed office as health minister, he was struck by b the prevailing biomedical paradigm for health development, with inadequate attention to effects of air, water, food -the main element for sustaining health and life, the environment and lifestyles on health development.

He said he did not want to become a minister of ill health supervising highly trained professionals who would spend all their time treating diseases that could be prevented; and injuries that could be avoided.

He said despite the perception that the health sector was adequately funded, the ministry was a 'broke ministry' when he become minister and that 2005 was a difficult year.

"Funding from some development partners became unpredictable while others had run out at a time when the sector lacked resources for procurement of essential public health commodities such as vaccines and contraceptives, he said. It was under such trying moment that the MOH, Ghana Health Service and the hospital were discussing splits rather than working together as a corporate entity, he said.

These notwithstanding, the ministry, he said had come a long way from the gloomy 2005 area to more result oriented one. A new paradigm for health development based on the theme; 'creating wealth through health', development of a new health policy and a five-year programme of work based on the paradigm and the launch of the Regenerative Health and Nutrition Programme to promote the adoption of healthy eating and living have been put in place to improve the health of Ghanaians.

He also mentioned better salaries for staff, introduction of National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), new NHIS drug list and tariffs structure and the moves to make nutrition and health and examinable subject in schools as some of the interventions put in place to contribute to major reforms in service delivery.

The Health Minister however noted that more needed to be done, especially in maternal mortality which he said was a national emergency adding that a ministerial taskforce would be established to help achieve MDGs5 to advise and oversee efforts at reducing it.

There was also the need to ensure that NHIS continued to benefit the poor and the vulnerable. He said the ministry through the NHIS secretariat had began a process to decouple the registration of children from their parents' subscription and reiterated his call on Ghanaians to register with the scheme.

Finance and Economic Planning Minister, Mr. Kwodwo Baah-Wiredu asked Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to live within their budget so that government would not need to borrow more and raise inflation. He commended development partners for their support but noted that more was needed to bridge the gap between budget shortfalls to keep MDAs running.

Ms. Lidi Remmelzwaal, Representative of Development Partners said it was sad that the maternal mortality which affected a larger part of the population was still very high and noted that more needed to be done in the area. She commended the NHIS saying; it has seen an impressive increase in registration, but however noted that the inclusion of the poorest into the scheme still remained a concern of the partners.

She also touched on food security which said was a challenge that went beyond health sector, without reversing the trend it could be become difficult to achieve the MDGs.