The Health and Environment Strategic Alliance (HESA) was established following the Libreville Declaration on Health and the Environment in 2008 to help coordinate action between the health and environment sectors, and to engage in country-level development planning processes – all with the aim of protecting and promoting public health and ecosystem integrity.
The HESA, with its mandate to support intersectoral action, has also become a key platform to support the concerted implementation of international agendas and agreements, such as the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Agenda 2063 of the African Union..
“Health and environment cuts across almost all 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Without addressing health and environment, there is no way we will achieve sustainable development by 2030” said by David Ombisi, Programme Manager, UN Environment.
Health and environment authorities as well as experts from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the UN Environment discussed today (7 November) a new framework to boost investments in public health and environment interventions across Africa.
With the Libreville Declaration on Health and the Environment for Africa adopted in 2008 by 52 countries in Africa, the need for joint environment and health initiatives has been well-recognized, but so far only limited financial resources have been available for such interventions. The new framework aims to stimulate government investments on large-scale health and environment development projects, which have the potential to impact socioeconomic development.
“I encourage colleagues from other countries to first identity their own gaps in terms of Health and Environment; by doing that, Uganda is making sure that all sectors integrate environment and health issues in their planning in their budgeting processes”, said the representative from Uganda.
Seychelles a small island state struggling with climate change
Jean Paul Adam, Minister of Health and Social Affairs of Seychelles talks about the challenges his country faces as it experiences the impact of climate change. Minister Jean Paul Adam is attending the Third Interministerial Conference on Health and Environment which is taking place in Libreville, Gabon.
Since the adoption of the Libreville Declaration on Health and Environment in 2008 by African Member States, much progress has been made in terms of interventions integrating these two areas. The institutional framework in the countries has also evolved, and action plans have been put in place. However, e financing or increasing financial resources for joint health and environment interventions still remains a major challenge.
The moderator of the session, Dr. Eléonore Armande Gandjeto, Deputy Director of the Cabinet of the Minister of Health of Benin, invited participants to propose actions that can be taken into consideration by ministers of health and the environment during their meeting which begins today.
Participants from different African countries each expressed their opinions and shared their experiences, proposing innovative ideas for financing health and environment in Africa including:
increasing the contribution of the national budget to health and environment interventions,
finding better planning mechanisms to efficiently direct the already available financial resources
favouring integrated and multisectoral actions, the challenge being to avoid increasing the tax burden faced by African populations. This could involve the integration of an environmental friendly component into all projects; an option that could be required by technical and financial partners, for example,
Denise Mekam’ne Edzidzi, Minister of State, Minister of Health of Gabon underlined the objective of the third inter-ministerial conference on health and the environment is to address the major challenges facing countries in terms of restoring and preserving the environment for better health.
How the environment impacts health
Dr Matshidiso Moeti, WHO Regional Director for Africa, speaks about the profound effect of the environment on health in Africa, as it does all over the world, through the air that people breathe, if it’s contaminated, water and sanitation and climate change.
Cabo Verde highlights its great expectations on this Conference, especially considering its vulnerability to climate change
The Minister of Health and Social Security of Cape Verde, Arlindo Rosário, highlights his great expectations on this Conference, especially considering the vulnerability that Cape Verde is facing as an insular country regarding climate change.
Chemicals and waste are integral to our everyday life, but they also have major impacts on the environment and human health. As the world’s population approaches 8 billion, the sound management of chemicals and waste is becoming ever more important.
The Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM) is a policy framework to promote chemical safety around the world. Its overall objective is the sound management of chemicals throughout their life cycle so that by the year 2020, chemicals are produced and used in ways that minimize significant adverse impacts on the environment and human health.
Looking forward beyond 2020, there are two capacity building initiatives that can assist countries in Africa to sustain their commitments on chemical safety. One of them is the Africa ChemsObs project, which aims to build the necessary capacity to set up an integrated health and environment observatory surveillance and information management system that will enable African countries to establish evidence-based policies and make sustainable decisions on sound management of chemicals and related disease burdens. The project addresses, in particular, the necessary improvements to be made in the fields of awareness, knowledge, information management and communication on chemicals to support and provide an enabling framework for measures and actions to be taken.
On the sidelines of the Inter-ministerial Conference on Health and Environment in Africa (IMCHE3), which is being held in Libreville from 6 to 9 November 2018, eleven ministers of health from the African Region took a guided tour of the Mother and Child University Hospital of the Jeanne Ebori Foundation on 7 November 2018.
In organizing this visit, as part of the sharing of experiences, the Minister of Health and Family, Denise Mekam'ne, accompanied by the WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr Moeti Matshidiso, presented the new method of managing and managing a public health structure.
"We wanted to show what Gabon is doing in terms of maternal and child health, and see how to share and build partnerships through a new management method that can serve as a reference point in the region and sub-region.
"State Minister of Health Denise Mekam'ne Edzidzie told reporters Ministers from Seychelles, Congo, Eswatini, Guinea Bissau, Gambia, Lesotho, Botswana, Burundi, Sierra Leone, Sao Tome, Cape Verde, and Ghana visited the paediatric emergency and gynaecology-obstetrics services.
Dr. Moeti was impressed by the technical platform and the specialties offered. "This is an excellent investment based on a primary health care health insurance system for mother and child that will provide patients with access to a high level technical platform."
The WHO Secretariat of IMCHE3 will publish a daily Electronic Journal (eJournal) during the conference. The easy-to-use eJournal is designed to improve interactions with our readers and to reach a wider readership. It offers features such as built-in videos, photo galleries and audio recordings. The eJournal will be distributed in the three WHO working languages namely English, French and Portuguese. The eJournal can be accessed by email on all computers, mobile phones, iPads and all types of mobile devices at any time during the Health and Environment Conference. Inquiries about the e-journal including suggestions for improvement should be sent to Phyllis Jiri on jirip@who.int
