Chagas Disease: Harmonization Model for Inter-Agency Cooperation

(edited by the PAHO Regional Program on Chagas Disease, Central American Initiative IPCA, 2006)

Full Text (in Spanish, PDF, 27 pp, 773 Kb, chapter headings translated below for user orientation)
Introduction | Background |
PEN-Chagas |  Inter-Agency Cooperation |
Main Achievements | Vision for the Future

Activities to Fight Chagas Disease in Honduras	IPCA Subregional Initiative

Other Subregional Initiatives
- INCOSUR (Southern Cone)
- AMCHA (Amazon)
- IPA (Andean)

Participating agencies: PAHO, Ministry of Health of Honduras,
JICA, Embassy of Japan, CIDA-Canada,
Pro-Mesas/IRDC (International Development Research Centre / IRDC, Canada),
the Government of Sweden, the Government of Taiwan,
World Vision Honduras, CARE, and other NGOs

Public-health programs have one common characteristic: few resources, which keep them from providing definitive solutions to these problems.

Chagas disease is a serious public-health problem in Honduras. Nevertheless, it being a disease occurring in rural areas among populations living in extreme poverty and far from the urban centers, who have no voice with which to advocate for the improvement of their condition, the fight against it has been postponed for many years. Isolated efforts on the part of different professionals in Honduras over the space of many years have made it possible to begin to better understand the epidemiological and entomological characteristics of the disease.

In recent years (1990), based on results obtained in the Southern Cone with the Intergovernmental Initiative for the Elimination of the Household Infestation by Triatoma infestans and the Interruption of Transfusional Transmission of Trypanosoma cruzi (INCOSUR), the Central American Initiative for the Interruption of Chagas Disease (IPCA) came into being.

From that time forward, the Ministry of Health began to strengthen its Chagas Disease Control Program, with support from PAHO. Furthermore, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)—which has a history of involvements in health areas in Central America—and the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA)—which works in several health areas in Honduras—initiated an alliance to support the program in Honduras.

The start of this joint effort came about relatively recently, but the results obtained to date permit some optimism in making it possible to foresee the future in positive terms vis-à-vis the resolution of this important health problem.

The preparation of the National Strategic Plan to Fight Chagas Disease (PEN-Chagas), with a clear definition of the technical and financial responsibilities both on the part of the Ministry of Health and of the different members, is what makes these assertions possible.

The great challenge is to maintain the sustainability of this program, since the results obtained to date have occurred over a medium term. Stopping vector-borne transmission of the disease in Honduras will take anywhere from 10 to 15 years after the startup of spraying and housing-improvement activities.

Finally, this example of coordination, effort, and shared institutional organizing, that that in fact began prior to alignment and harmonization proposals (High-Level Forum, Rome, 2003), can very well serve as orientation for the different international organizations working in Honduras, to make for more effective international cooperation.