Jamaica has affirmed its commitment to achieving universal health coverage, amidst growing and varied public health challenges facing the country and the world.
“The challenges we face include the growing crisis of NCDs, including mental health problems; the worrying trend of low immunization take up; inadequate health care financing; the need to digitise health systems for resilience; and the imperative of pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response,” said Minister of Health & Wellness, Dr. the Hon. Christopher Tufton.
He was speaking at the 76th World Health Assembly in Geneva, Switzerland on Tuesday, May 23.
“Together, these and other public health challenges make the prioritisation of universal health coverage essential, including in developing countries whose populations are faced with peculiar vulnerabilities – and in the context of a triple planetary crisis, notably climate change, pollution, and nature loss,” the Minister added.
Universal health coverage is concerned with providing the population with the full range of quality health services they need, when and where they need them, without financial hardship. It covers the full continuum of essential health services, including health promotion, prevention, treatment, rehabilitation and palliative care.
According to Dr. Tufton, “Jamaica refuses to cower in the face of these challenges” and is “adopting the ‘Health in All’ and ‘Life Course’ approaches to safeguarding public health – while implementing policies and programmes that answer our population’s health needs”.
He noted that those policies and programmes include primary care reform; the digitisation of Jamaica’s health system; physical infrastructure upgrades; and attention to the required human resources for health.
Dr. Tufton is leading the Jamaica delegation, including the island’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Jacquiline Bisasor-McKenzie, to the World Health Assembly.