Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen, Distinguished National and International Guests,
Dear all Participants!
Dear all Participants!
Today, I am delighted to be here with Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen in the Closing of the 34th Health Conference and 11th Joint Review of Achievements in the Health Sector.
This conference is a good opportunity
for us to jointly review all past achievements, opportunities, and
challenges to identify proper and comprehensive solutions and measures
that are in line with health targets of the Cambodia’s Millennium
Development Goals (CMDGs) and to mobilize more active participation from
concerned ministries, institutions, development partners and agencies
as well as national and international NGOs so that we can realize more
success for the nation.
Taking
this opportunity, I would like to commend and highly value the
management, officials, personnel, doctors, dentists, midwives,
pharmacists and nurses of the Ministry of Health, hospitals, health
centers and stations for working hard to manage and provide all kinds of
health services to cure patients that result in this remarkable
progress in the health sector. The progress of the health sector has not
only promoted people’s trust, respect, love and support for the Royal
Government and our health system, but also the reputation of the Kingdom
of Cambodia as a whole. In addition, I also would like to highly value
development partners and agencies, national and international NGOs for
the cooperation and assistance in both the preparation and the
implementation of plans of the health sector to increase the efficiency
of health service delivery to the people, in the cause of public welfare
enhancement and accelerated poverty reduction and socio-economic
development, in line with the spirit of “Rectangular Strategy Phase II” of the Royal Government for Growth, Employment, Equity and Efficiency in Cambodia.
Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen, Distinguished National and International Guests, and Participants!
The Royal Government has always
prioritized the development of the health sector to enhance the
delivery, efficiency, equity and sustainability of health services,
especially for the poor, the vulnerable and people living in rural
areas. With respect to that, the Royal Government has been working hard
to reduce maternal and infant mortality rates, expand physical
infrastructure of the health sector, and intensify the implementation of
important health programs such as the reproductive health program,
nutrition program, health education program, infectious disease combat
and prevention program especially AIDs, tuberculosis, malarias, dengue
fever and measles and so forth.
In order to implement this spirit, the
Royal Government has gradually increased the budget to support the
implementation of activities in the health sector and to ensure adequacy
of medical instruments and equipment and medicines in hospitals,
referral hospitals, health centers and stations across the country.
Moreover, the Royal Government has also paid attention to strengthening
competencies and professional ethics of all levels of health personnel,
particularly doctors, midwives and nurses to ensure the delivery of
consultation, check-up, care, and treatment services are conducted
timely, in a dignified, friendly and indiscriminate manner.
In
this sense, I am truly pleased with all the achievements in 2012. In
fact, our achievements in expanding the physical infrastructure in the
health sector include 99 health centers, 10 health stations, labor and
delivery rooms in 7 health centers, waiting rooms for delivery in 115
health centers and 3 referral hospitals that are mostly located in
provinces. The expansion of coverage of health’s physical infrastructure
to rural areas and the progress of the communication infrastructure
mean health services are moving closer to the people. It is now more
convenient to provide consultation, check-up, care, and treatment
services to the people. In addition, 2012 is the year of prideful
success in our effort to improve maternal and infant health, to combat
both infectious and non-infectious diseases and to strengthen the health
system as a whole. With respect to that, there was “Zero Case”
of measles infection in 2012. The Ministry of Health will continue to
monitor the development of this disease for the next two years. If there
is no measles case during this period, the WHO will certify Cambodia as
a measles-free country. Along with this, it should also be noted that
more than 90 percent of children under one received vaccination; the
indicators of our effort to combat infectious diseases show positive
progress by achieving the yearly targets; the survival rate of person
infected with HIV is more than 90 percent after receiving treatment; the
completely cure rate of patients with tuberculosis is more than 85
percent; and the mortality rate from malaria has decreased by 52
percent. Evidently, these achievements clearly reflect the daily
improvement of the health condition of our people.
Taking this opportunity, on behalf of
the Royal Government and myself, I would like to sincerely thank and
highly value the management, civil servants, doctors, health officers
and workers of the Ministry of Health, hospitals, referral hospitals,
health centers and health stations as well as concerned
ministries/institutions, private sector, and all types of professional
associations for the active participation and good cooperation that
result in such great achievement.
Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is the absolute truth that these
achievements and good progress in the health sector cannot be realized
without either financial or technical contribution from friend
countries, development partners, local and international NGOs and
private sector. These contributions are necessary to ensure public
welfare and the health sector’s progress and sustainability.
Furthermore, the Royal Government is committed to expanding the
healthcare coverage, improving the quality of health services, improving
the manners of health service providers, securing sufficient funding to
ensure regular and adequate supply of equipment and medicines,
strengthening the competencies of healthcare employees, improving the
medicine supply system, strengthening the health information system and
so forth.
In addition, the Royal Government has
been working to increase the number and improving the distribution of
doctors, health officers, midwives, male and female nurses in the health
system through various training and capacity building programs,
including the dispatch of medical doctors and trainees to sharpen their
competency and enrich their knowledge at both national and international
levels and the increased monetary incentive for health officers in the
countryside. The Royal Government is also constantly working to promote
the professional ethics of all medical doctors and health officers in
order for them to become effective health service providers. In this
sense, The government officials, doctors and health employees must
firmly adhere to the code of professional ethics when communicating with
the people or patients and stick to technical principle and good manner
when consulting, examining, caring and treating patients so that they
feel comfortable and have more trust in the health system.
At the same time, the Royal Government
also acknowledges some shortcomings such as the outbreaks of new
infectious diseases, limited capacity to provide emergency maternity and
infant care services at local communities, and limited capacity of
certain clinics to accurately diagnose patients. In addition, the
diseases’ monitoring system, data collection and data recording system
at health centers has not fully integrated with the health information
system and institutions’ technical capacities for systematic work are
still limited. These are the challenges that must be jointly addressed.
In spite of the government’s heavy investment in medical technologies,
information technologies, strengthening of institutional capacities over
the years to tackle challenges in the health sector, to ensure more
accurate diagnosis and improve the effectiveness of treatment, there is
still more to be done to meet the demand. Therefore we have to continue
mobilizing investment in the health sector in order to strengthen our
medical technologies and health information system, particularly the
monitoring system, data recording and data collection system at all
levels and all places in order to enable timely action and health
officials to take advantage of this information to gradually improve the
delivery of health services.
Taking this opportunity, to contribute
some inputs to the conference and the preparation of health strategic
plan for 2013, I would like to make the following recommendations:
First,
The Ministry of Health must continue improving the implementation of
the reproductive health program, and the maternal and infant health
program and their respective action plans in order to accelerate the
decrease of maternal and infant mortality rate by promoting pre-delivery
health services for expectant mothers, encouraging baby delivery at
health centers or referral hospitals, expanding emergency maternity and
infant care services at local level but comprehensivizing these services
at referral hospitals and health centers, building more pre-delivery
waiting and delivery rooms at rural health centers, increasing locations
for the program for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of
HIV (PMTCT) and expanding HIV blood test services to provide
HIV-infected pregnant women with anti-retroviral drugs.
Second,
the Ministry of Health must intensify the implementation of programs to
combat all kinds of infectious diseases by strengthening the measures
to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS and increase access to care and
treatment services for leisure workers, increasing the number of
counseling and voluntary blood testing centers, expanding the care and
treatment service network for HIV/AIDS patients at their homes. The
strengthening of cooperation between the public health and private
sector in fighting against the tuberculosis, the enhancement of ability
of health officials and villages volunteers to timely diagnose and treat
malaria patients and the increased distribution of long-lasting treated
mosquito nets, treatment of existing mosquito nets with insecticide or
mosquito repellant in targeted villages, increase of education on
malaria and its prevention techniques, and timely response to disease
outbreak must be paid attention to. At the same time, the Ministry of
Health must strengthen the disease monitoring and alerting system to
enable timely and efficient action in case of any outbreak of the
epidemic diseases.
Third,
the Ministry of Health must further modernize hospitals, health
centers, and health stations and all health service providers and
promote the human resource development, increase instruments, medical
materials and improve care and treatment techniques. In addition, the
Ministry of Health must promote and expand medical research by closely
cooperating with the University of Health, private sector and
organizations and professional associations as well as encouraging and
ensuring appropriate incentives for the new findings that are benificial
for human being.
Fourth,
the Ministry of Health must pay more attention to the preparation of
work program and schedule for medical doctors, dentists, phamacists,
midwives, nurses “by ensuring that all hospitals and
referral hospitals and health centers have stand-by medical doctors
every day, every hour, even during public holidays”
to ensure the all-time availability of health services for the people
and patients and we must ensure the firm implementation of these
program/work schedule with rules and code of professional ethics.
Fifth,
the Ministry of Health must take firm measures by implementing them
like drizzling rain and closely cooperating with all related
ministries/institutions and all competent authorities in order to
eliminate counterfeit medicines, substandard medical instruments and
materials, illegal phamacies and clinics, while violators must be
punished according to applicable laws and counterfeit products must be
confiscated and destroyed.
Sixth,
the Ministry of Health must promote and encourage the private sector to
acivley participate in health sector development in order to fill the
gaps by paying main attention to strengthening and expanding the
coverage and quality of consultation, care and treatment services to be
more comprehensive with full confidence from the patients.
Seventh,
the Ministry of Health must continue the close cooperation with related
institutions and other stakeholders to jointly address intersectoral
challenges such as the impact of climate change, catastrophes and the
associated effects on human health. In this regard, the Ministry of
Health must be well prepared to intervene quickly and promote the
comprehensive dissemination to prevent and reduce various diseases such
as the dengue fever, malaria, bird flu (A/H1N1) and so forth.
Before ending, I once again deeply
thank Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen for participating in this
conference and contributing ideas, knowledge, perspectives and good
experiences to make our conference a fruitful success. In addition, I
would like to appeal to Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen to transform
all recommendations, information, knowledge and expereiences gained from
this conference into actual implementation to achieve more success.
At the end, along with the closing of “34th Health Conference and 11th Joint Review of Health Sector’s Achievements”
today, I would like to wish Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,
national and international distinguished guests and all participants the
four gems of Buddhist blessing: Longevity Nobility, Healthiness, and Strength./.
