EDITORIAL - Support Centre of Excellence

All things considered, by now Santa Cruz should have had its own hospital to serve the needs of its growing population and to enhance its reputation as a thriving, urban centre on Jamaica's south coast.

The next best thing, it seems, is the Santa Cruz Health Centre of Excellence.

We applaud the vision of Health Minister Dr Fenton Ferguson, who has planned similar centres in Westmoreland, St Thomas, and St Ann as a means of easing the pressure on traditional hospitals, which are generally under severe strain to effectively and efficiently deal with patient care. He anticipates that these centres will become one-stop facilities offering a range of services, including pharmaceuticals.

Santa Cruz was taken through a $25-million upgrade so that it can now offer services such as laboratory, dental, maternal and child health, HIV, family planning, mental health, curative, cervical cancer screening, health promotion, and education. Phase two, which calls for $88 million in capital expenditure, will provide more facilities for the comfort of patients and staff.

NON-COMMUNICABLE DISEASES CONTROL

The focus on primary health-care services is well placed for it creates opportunities to manage and control non-communicable diseases (NDCs), which although non-infectious, are the top killers of adults who form the workforce and are usually breadwinners. Local medical experts attribute 70 per cent of annual deaths to NCDs such as hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and cancers.

The annual expenditure of some US$170 million to treat NCDs confirms the staggering effect on the economy and the uphill battle policymakers have to ensure a healthy, productive nation.

And the burden on the country's economy will no doubt increase unless there are urgent initiatives to combat this epidemic of NCDs, which is growing, in our region.

Dr Ferguson stressed that the Government is committed to the World Health Assembly resolution of 2012 to reduce permanent deaths from non-communicable diseases by 25 per cent by 2025.

Community-based interventions will obviously play a critical role in achieving these objectives as the solution lies in behavioural and social change. This must necessarily include education about the risk factors implicated in the increase of NCDs such as smoking, excessive alcohol intake, unhealthy diets, and low physical activity.

We suggest that an aggressive awareness campaign is needed to drive home the point that NCDs are preventable through changes in behaviour at the individual level. This phase must be followed up with risk assessment and screening facilitated by the centres of excellence and other health-care facilities.

Dr Ferguson has said the drive to improve primary health care was part of a transformational "mission" by his Government to improve every aspect of Jamaica's health care, including the provision of cheaper and easier access to cancer care.

This is not merely a health issue, it is a developmental problem. It's an initiative that should gain the support of all, starting in the communities where the impact of death, disability, and other illnesses influenced by NCDs is greatly felt.

The opinions on this page, except for the above, do not necessarily reflect the views of The Gleaner. To respond to a Gleaner editorial, email us: editor@gleanerjm.com or fax: 922-6223. Responses should be no longer than 400 words. Not all responses will be published.