Community, Private Sector Involvement Crucial to Achieving Health Goals, says Prof Paul Rutter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:
Dr Paul Rutter, Regional Advisor (Health), UNICEF, today said private sector involvement and systemic quality improvement were crucial to minimising maternal and infant mortality rates in India and other parts of the world and thereby achieving the health-related targets of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations.

Addressing a webinar on “Achieving SDGs related to Maternal Mortality Rate and Infant Mortality Rate – Dream or Reality,” organised by Department of Health and Family Welfare, Government of Kerala, he lauded the state for ensuring community engagement, social accountability, and decentralised governance in primary healthcare.

Listing a number of other steps required to be taken in India and elsewhere, Dr Rutter said key interventions to improve coverage and quality and a strong primary healthcare founded in communities should be the base for achieving universal health coverage and meeting the SDGs by 2030.

“Private sector engagement and systemic quality improvement are keys to accelerating the healthcare programme,” he noted.

Explaining the components of quality, he said ensuring availability of essential medicines and compliance with evidence-based clinical interventions and practices, besides ramping up infrastructure, was of paramount importance to drastically reduce the death rates.

The number of deaths due to poor quality of services was far greater at 5 million a year in the world than due to non-utilisation of health services which stood at 3.5 million, he pointed out. For South Asia, the figures stood at one million and 1.9 million. In terms of percentage, it was 58 for the world and 64 for South Asia.

He advised governments across the globe to support research in vaccines and medicines and increase budget allocations for health and health workers. He suggested that halving the number of deaths and injuries caused in traffic accidents would also be of help.

On reproductive health, he said offering universal access was the key.

The second phase of the five-day international Health Webinar began today with one session today and another tomorrow. The webinar series was inaugurated by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on February 17.