Quashigah Wins The Hearts And Minds ....

... Of His Colleagues Ministers Of Health At The Ongoing 60th World Health Assembly In Geneva

Each year the World health Organization (WHO) brings together Ministers of Health from all Member states to the World Health Assembly (WHA). The 60th World Health Assembly is being held in Geneva from 14 to 23 Mmay 2007. The theme for this year's Assembly is International Health Security.

As is normal with the World health Assembly, Ministers of health are given 5 minutes to make a statement on theme and other relevant national health issues of concern. When it came to the turn of Ghana, Major Courage E.K. Quashigah (rtd.) Minister of Health, gave a heavily loaded, mind searching five minute speech which his colleague ministers deascribed as "food for thought" an the Director General of WHO, Dr Margaret Chan, described as "great and spot on". Quashigah was immediately whisked away by the Saudi Television for an interview. Here is the speech that caused the Stir reproduced in full:

STATEMENT BY MAJOR COURAGE E.K. QUASHIGAH (RTD.) THE MINISTER OF HEALTH OF GHANA, AT THE 60TH WORLD HEALTH ASSEMBLY, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND, 15TH MAY, 2007

Madam President,

I wish to join my colleagues in congratulating you on your appointment as the President of the 60th World Health Assembly.

I also take this opportunity to congratulate Dr. Margaret Chan on her appointment as the New Director General.

Madam President,

Today, developing countries are confronted with communicable, non-communicable, pregnancy-related and nutritional-related diseases as well as by threats of invasive and potentially disruptive outbreaks of diseases such as Avian Flu and SARS.

As a result of globalization all nations anywhere on this planet are vulnerable to invasion by diseases as well as the social and economic shocks of outbreaks. Some experts even claim that there is no such thing as a “localized” disease outbreak anymore.

It is for this reason that I consider the focus of this Assembly on International Health Security to be timely, appropriate and relevant to the individual countries as well as the international community.

Madam President,

If I add my experiences in security as a soldier to the WHO definition of health, then ‘INTERNATIONAL HEALTH SECURITY” requires that we mobilise local and international knowledge, resources and action to protect people against any attack or injury on their physical, mental and social wellbeing.

For us in Africa today, we are very far from assuring the health security of our people. It is now becoming embarrassing as we in Africa enumerate the cohort of diseases invading us, particularly those that some countries have relegated to history. We also seem to be adding on diseases that were once associated with western life style.

Madam President,

We are unhealthy because we have over the years taken the elements that sustain life – Air, Water and Food- for granted.

Through human activities, we have defiled the environment and destroyed the purity and sanctity of these elements. We are now paying a heavy toll in terms of morbidity and mortality.

Our response to the high burden of diseases has been to invest and continue to invest in biomedical technology, drugs, hospitals and health centres, which do not produce health but deal with ill health.

Most of our Ministries of Health can best be described as Ministries of Ill-health.

And yet, we are the ones who do not have the technology, facilities or resources to deal with this devastating situation we have brought onto ourselves.

Madam President,

This immediately sends a strong signal for a paradigm shift from our traditional thinking that health is produced by health workers or in hospitals, to the fact that health is produced in homes, from what people eat and drink, where they live and work, and how they live.

It is in this light that Ghana has decided to make a u-turn to trace our routes back and recapture the very things our fore bears were doing to maintain health and longevity. Unfortunately living a healthy lifestyle is sometimes considered primitive.

Madam President,

Last year, in my statement to this Assembly, I stated that Ghana has adopted a paradigm shift in health by de-medicalizing health and focusing more on health promotion and disease prevention.

Today, I am happy to announce that we have developed a new health policy and a 5 Year Programme of Work. The theme of this policy is “Creating Wealth through Health”. Our focus is on addressing the social determinants of health i.e. nutrition, water, environmental sanitation, physical activity, rest, recreation.

The Ministry of Health in consultation with other key stakeholders have also introduced a programme called the "Regenerative Health and Nutrition Programme", as a novel approach based on Ancient wisdom applied in contemporary language to solve the numerous health problems invading us as a nation.

This is a community based training programme to establish change agents. It focuses on healthy lifestyles and promotes exercise, environmental cleanliness, relaxation, consumption of adequate quantities of water, healthy eating emphasising eating fruits, vegetables, other plant foods and a reduction in the consumption of animal products.

The training targets health care workers, schools and hospital matrons, caterers, midwives, traditional rulers, teachers, and other major stakeholders in the communities.

We are aggressively copying from communities that are practicing regenerative health and nutrition, which by adopting healthy lifestyle programmes, are achieving remarkable results.

• These communities have virtually eradicated many of the diseases impacting on Africa and the Western World. • They have no evidence of HIV/AIDS, hypertension, obesity, cancer and Diabetes. • And have recorded remarkable reductions in maternal and child mortality

This may sound like a fairy tale, but it is real because I have seen it personally; and not told or read it from books.

Madam President,

You will appreciate that we in Ghana are not expecting exceptional results overnight. The health of the people that has Degenerated over the years, will take time to Regenerate.

Our vision is that the future generations will inculcate health enhancing habits early in their lives and win the war against the enemy, called disease.

Madam President, Colleague ministers, ladies and gentlemen,

Ghana is ready and prepared to share this effort with others for a better, healthier and wealthier world.

I am convinced that health can create wealth by saving on the cost of the heavy burden of diseases, ensuring healthier stronger and more active human capital to achieve higher productivity. This is the only way we can assure health security, which will eventually lead to poverty reduction and bring about wealth creation.