Health Ministers Summit Concludes after Election of New PAHO Director

Washington, September 27, 2002 (PAHO) - The summit of health ministers from the Americas that elected an Argentine doctor as Director of the Pan American Health Organization concludes today.

The 26th Pan American Sanitary Conference elected Dr. Mirta Roses Periago, the first woman and first Argentine to head the Pan American Health Organization, which celebrates its Centennial this year. She will assume office for a five-year term starting in February 2003, replacing Dr. George Alleyne of Barbados.

In the week-long conference, major reports were presented to health ministers for discussion, including: Health in the Americas, Public Health in the Americas, and a quadrennial report, Charting a Future for Health in the Americas.

Health ministers also considered urgent health topics for the Region of the Americas, which ranges from Canada to Chile. They created a special fund to reduce maternal mortality in the Americas, noting a PAHO document that said, "The unnecessarily high death rate of women as a result of complications from pregnancy and childbirth constitutes a tragedy in Latin America and the Caribbean." It added, "Pregnancy and childbirth are not a disease, yet women in Latin America and the Caribbean are still dying from the same causes as women in industrialized countries in the early twentieth century. Although the maternal mortality ratio has stagnated since the issue of safe motherhood became prominent in the late 1980s and early 1990s, maternal mortality continues to be a public health priority in which little progress has been achieved in recent times," the document noted.

Another priority subject was the situation of the AIDS epidemic in the Americas, where 2.8 million people live with the HIV/AIDS. With an incidence rate of 16% in adults, the Caribbean is the second area most affected with the world after sub-Saharan Africa. On this point, the Conference asked the countries to "make the greatest effort to meet the goals of the United Nations Declaration on HIV/AIDS, especially those aimed at preventing HIV infection; providing care, support, and treatment to people living with HIV/AIDS; and reducing the stigma and social exclusion associated with the epidemic."

Ministers also urged exploring new ways to continue to reduce the price of antiretroviral drugs for people living with AIDS.

On vaccines and immunization, the ministers set a goal of 95 percent vaccination coverage of all children in all countries, a necessary step to ensure the success of PAHO's measles elimination program. They also set as a priority the incorporation of new vaccines or combinations in routine vaccination schedules, especially for respiratory and diarrheal diseases, with the objective of equity in immunization in the entire continent.

Ministers discussed the need to closely monitor the yellow fever situation , using sensitive surveillance systems, especially in areas infested with Aedes aegypti.

Another important topic was the expansion of the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) strategy to save children's lives, which is being used in 17 countries with high infant mortality rates and has already saved tens of thousands of lives. It is now being incorporated into curricula to teach health workers at all levels how to treat children.

In a related matter, The United States was elected to PAHO's nine-country Executive Committee, along with Dominica and Paraguay, to replace Bolivia, Canada and Guyana, whose three-year terms have expired.

PAHO, which also serves as the Regional Office for the Americas of the World Health Organization, was established in 1902. PAHO Member States include all 35 countries in the Americas. France, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland are Participating States. PAHO is celebrating 100 years of work with all the countries of the Americas to improve the health and raise the living standards of their peoples.

For more information, b-roll and photographs please contact: Daniel Epstein, Office of Public Information, (202) 974-3459, e-mail: epsteind@paho.org.