Dear Editor,
In a lengthy letter (KN, September 15), Dr Leslie Ramsammy, Guyana’s Minister of Health wrote among other things, that “more than 95% of our children are protected against some of the world’s most devastating diseases. We have been able to reduce maternal and infant mortality by half in the last 15 years.”
Once again, Dr Ramsammy is using language which is almost scientifically meaningless in terms of the state of children’s health in the country. What exactly does the Minister mean when he says that 95% of our children are protected against some of the world’s most devastating diseases? And, assuming we believe that maternal and infant mortality rates have indeed been reduced by 50% in last 15 years, we still do not know the magnitude of the problem in terms of absolute numbers.
Ironically, Dr Bheri Ramsaram, the Minister within the Ministry of Health indicates in the Stabroek News (‘Sprinkles nutrition programme for all health centres, September 19) that there is a “high level of iron deficiency, acute malnutrition and chronic malnutrition among Guyana’s children.”
It should be a legal requirement that data on the nation’s health emanating from the Ministry of Health be made publicly available so that it can be independently analysed. In this way, improvements can be made to the entire data collection, storage, analysis, and release process.
This would go a far way in building confidence in our country’s state of health, and planning for improvement. It would be a scientifically driven process and the data would be accessible for various types of studies. Most countries have such a system in place. We need to be more progressive in public health and this can only happen with a data-driven scientific process.
Yours faithfully,
Somdat Mahabir
