The review process started on the 10 of April, and it attracted several health partners including the World Health Organization, UNICEF, DFID and medical workers from all parts of the country.
Giving an overview of the review process, MoHS Planning Specialist, Alhassan Fouad Kanu stated that his ministry had introduced a sector-wide review in the country since 2015. Alhassan maintained that the review process was initiated to actually measure the achievements as well as lapses of the activities implemented by his ministry, in order to maintain and improve the essential delivery standard of the ministry.
According to Alhassan the review process would enhance the production of a well informed health sector annual report, as he ascertained that the review was specifically aimed at reviewing the activities of directorates, programs, and District Health Management Teams for the implementation of the sector-wide activities, including the Presidential Recovery Priorities as well as identifying challenges and opportunities for the 24 months plans of MoHS.
World Health Organization’s country representative, Dr. Anders Nordstrom expressed satisfaction over the excellent performance of the ministry since the end of the Ebola. He said that his organization would continue to provide the needed support for the ministry so as to keep it working towards improving the health status of citizens of this nation.
In her statement, the DFID Team Leader, Angela Spilsbury, congratulated the Ministry for their timely and accurate report on activities for which they had received money for from DFID. She furthered that DFID was the sole sponsor of the annual review process that is currently going on and that they were impressed with the process and would always be there to provide support for the Ministry of Health and Sanitation.
Deputy Minister of Health and Sanitation, Madam Madina Rahman, established that Sierra Leone’s health sector like any other health sector around the world was inevitably confronted with a lot of challenges. Those challenges according to her, ranged from economic crises, environmental disasters, and infectious disease outbreaks to hidden epidemics of mental illness and malnutrition. She said that the Ebola left our country very much exposed to a lot of other life threatening health problems such as mental health, the emerging chronic diseases such as cancers and diabetes among others.
She further explained that in order to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, her ministry had developed a growing consensus that would help strength the country’s health sector. “As a country, we victoriously moved from E (Ebola) to H (Health) and our collective efforts are towards building a resilient and responsive health system”. She added.
The minister continued by calling on all to step forward and joined hands with the Health Ministry so as to improve and further strengthen the country’s health system. She thanked and delighted partners especially DEFID and the World Health Organization for their continual support to the growth of the health system. She said that resilient health systems would help deliver necessary services and must be able to absorb the shocks and sustain the gains already made in the health sector or risk having decades of investment wiped off.
She ascertained that many health system players were found outside the traditional health system and incorporating them required working with diverse groups including policy makers, activists, community representatives, administrators, and more. She stressed that the review would be useful for the improvement of the country’s health system
