The Ministry of Health and Medical Services (MHMS) on the 10th and 11th June conducted its first inception Heads of Health Meeting consisting of the Senior Executive Management team and all the Provincial Executive Management team from the at the Heritage Park Hotel, Honiara.
The Heads of Health Meeting aims to; update Heads of Health on the new current progress made at the national level, to improve and strengthen the linkages and connectivity between the national and subnational executive teams, to understand the challenges and bottlenecks experienced by the Heads of Health in the delivery of quality health services, to hear the voices from the field and how better both executive management teams (National and Provincial) can work better together to progress the mandates of the Health Sector and the strategic objectives of the National Strategic Health Plan 2022-2031.
Speaking at the official opening of the meeting, Health Permanent Secretary Mrs. Pauline McNeil welcome all the participants and reiterated on the importance of the meeting. “The Ministry of Health and Medical Services plays a critical role in the delivery of health services in the country, and as Heads of Health, all of you plays a part in this critical role.
“The Solomon Islands Heads of Health Meeting is critical for harnessing resources, communicating efficiently and effectively to enable and inform decision, taking stock on progress and nonprogress made, and challenges experienced at both the national and subnational level due to the ongoing changes. Such require our joint and collaborative efforts as Heads of Health in the health sector”, said PS McNeil.
Health Minister Honourable Dr. Paul Popora Bosawai said the MHMS National Health Strategic Plan (NHSP) 2022-2031, its vision is for the people of Solomon Islands to have “a healthy future for all” by 2031, and a goal to “ensure that all Solomon Islanders have universal access to equitable quality, preventative, curative, rehabilitative and promotional health services, irrespective of where they live”.
He said despite all the efforts in advancing health services. There are ongoing challenges and bottlenecks at global, regional and local level that hampered some of the needed services reaching remote areas and islands across the country, therefore we are not alone in our challenges.
“Additionally, new and emerging diseases are threats to the health systems, hence, a continuous need in the changing and introduction of new policies and regulations and monitoring of key resources for health services implementation to meet the systems need”.
However, he said going forward some areas are needed to be addressed, which are; Health Governance, Health Infrastructure, Health Workforce, Sustainable Medical Supplies and Health Financing.
In closing his remarks, the Health Minister reminded the Provincial Health Directors and Provincial Directors of Nursing that they are the engineers in the health sector, and the Senior Executive Managements as captain of the ship. “Together everyone plays a critical role in the health system of this country, that is to ensure a healthy future for all”.
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