she said

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Guyana’s collaboration with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has seen a notable increase in the rate of vaccination of children under the age of one in Regions Six and 10.  This collaboration has also helped to improve the ability of the Ministry of Health to provide drugs and other medical supplies to health facilities within one week of request and to increase staffing of health care teams within the regions.The recently commissioned in-patient facilityAccording to IDB Operations Specialist, Leslie-Ann Edwards, “all of these were indicators under the bank’s programme that we have been able to track and report on the results.”She revealed that the IDB’s support to Guyana dates back to a project in 1978 and since then the bank has continued to collaborate in a number of areas. Among these are far reaching infrastructural development and institutional reform that contribute to increases in the quality of both health care delivery and patient care and well being, Edwards said.It was against this supportive background, she said, that the construction of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC)’s state-of-the-art in-patient facility was brought to fruition.“This was one of the key investment activities under the health sector reform programme funded by the IDB and executed by the Ministry of Health.”The reform programme, she said, was initialised in 2005 and came to an end in June of this year, which is another notable achievement. Also under the programme was the construction of the Linden Hospital Complex which was commissioned in December of 2009.“Again this hospital (Linden Hospital) marked a significant achievement in the Government’s commitment to providing first class health care services outside of the city limits.”These infrastructural developments with the health sector, she explained, were framed within the Government’s National Development Strategy 2001-2010 which the bank had been happy to support. And while the GPHC in-patient facility together with the Linden Hospital have been two of the visible and tangible results of the programme, there have been other achievements, Edwards noted.The programme, she explained, also supported initiatives aimed at improving the organisational and institutional capacity of the health sector through information technology, human resource development and strengthening of the pharmaceutical delivery system.She admitted, though, that while the construction of the recently commissioned in-patient facility was not an easy task, “I am told that it was a labour of love, drive and at times sheer willpower and commitment by both project teams within the IDB and the Government.”  The ultimate result was however a success, as according to Edwards, there were many creative approaches that were employed using joint decision making and a large degree of flexibility to mitigate many of the risks that cropped up along the way.The $1.6B in-patient facility was a few years under construction but was finally commissioned earlier this month and is expected to help improve the delivery of health care offered by the public hospital.In commending the completion of the facility, Edwards said that the IDB is committed to continuing its support towards the development of the health sector in Guyana and “we welcome further opportunities to deepen our relationship in this area.”