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Minister of Health, Donville Inniss, accepting his copy of the Pharmaceutical Country Profile Reports from PAHO/World Health Organisation (WHO) Representative for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean Countries, Dr. Merle Lewis. (BGIS)??

Minister of Health, Donville Inniss, along with the Ministers of Health from St. Lucia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines, were recently presented with the Pharmaceutical Country Profile Reports by the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO).

PAHO/World Health Organisation (WHO) Representative for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean Countries, Dr. Merle Lewis, handed over the reports at the organisation’s Barbados offices at Dayrells Road, Christ Church.

Suriname, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, St Lucia, Dominica and St Vincent and the Grenadines are the first countries in the Caribbean sub-region to complete this exercise.

PAHO/WHO has been supporting member states with the collection, analysis and use of pharmaceutical sector data, which are crucial for informing decision-making in the different areas of the pharmaceutical policy and advocacy work. This exercise is being conducted worldwide in partnership with the Global Fund, an international financial institution that invests money to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

Once authorisation is granted from the respective Ministries of Health, the country information is made available to the public. All of the partners, researchers, policy-makers and those who are interested in the pharmaceutical sector of the countries will find this profile a useful tool for their activities.

A comprehensive assessment of the pharmaceutical sector also assists PAHO/WHO staff members in determining which support activities will be the most appropriate for each country and allows for evaluating the impact of interventions over time.

These Reports will form part of the Regional Platform on Access and Innovation for Health Technologies which was launched on Monday, May 7, at PAHO’s headquarters in Washington D.C., United States. This platform has been developed by PAHO to bring together regional and international stakeholders, and support networks to promote access and innovation to health technologies in the Americas. The platform will comprise of a series of internet-based tools that will help support and promote innovation, access, rational use, regulation and governance in the area of medicines and other strategic public health technologies from a public health perspective.

melissa.rollock@barbados.gov.bb

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