By Anna Gaskell Observer Staff Writer (Charlestown, Nevis) – Hensley Daniel, the Nevis Minister for Health, is a busy man. But he doesn’t mind making the time to talk to me about health in the Federation. The government budget for health, he says, comes second only to the budget for education. Health has been in the spotlight recently thanks to the launching of the “National Strategic Health Plan”, on Nov. 6. The plan is federal in scope, but Mr. Daniel’s comments mainly refer to Nevis. It is a finely detailed plan; it has obviously been carefully thought out. There will be seven priority areas of focus: Chronic non-communicable diseases, nutrition and physical activity, family health and substance abuse, HIV/AIDS and STIs, health and environment, and human resource development. And there are three main thrusts: advancing health and the social, political and economic determinants of health; addressing the challenges relating to each priority area; looking ahead to the implementation of these priority areas. Thursday Online Code for Issue # 735 is EG1 It sounds promising. But how will it be paid for? And how will it actually work? Nevis currently gets both educational and financial help from its partnerships with various institutions, such as the Jackson Memorial Hospital and the Canadian Medical Network (CMN), Mr. Daniel says. These institutions would continue to share medical information with the island, and play a part in the financing of the Plan. Mr. Daniel also hopes that a “National Health Insurance” would help with the funding of the services. When I ask how soon the “Health Insurance” would be set up, he says, “We have already begun the consultations, which is the first step.” For it to work, “people have to understand that they have to pay for services.” The plan has a greater chance of working if it is financed properly. The money will bring the training, the equipment, and the ability to monitor the changing patterns in overall health in the Federation. The plan aims to systematically increase the chances of good health for each person in the Federation. But it will be up to the public to make it work. Mr. Daniel says he wishes he could make it easier for people to be healthy. One of his ambitions is to make “bad food” really expensive and good, healthy food really cheap. That would involve a big battle with the big food processing companies, and sadly I”m not sure Mr. Daniel would win. He thinks it’s extremely important that health remains “in the public consciousness.” He says health should not be thought about in isolation. It is deeply connected to agriculture, tourism, trade and education in the Federation. Mr. Daniel explains: health ties into the agricultural sector because a healthy diet depends on the availability of good fresh food. The “aesthetic appeal” of the country keeps tourists coming back, and they like to be ‘somewhere that is seen to look after its people and its environment.” And of course they”d like to be somewhere they”re not afraid to fall sick. Health is connected to trade too, the importation of food from outside. And of course, education and health must be tightly interlinked. The sectors must “work together.” School children “must develop an awareness of the importance of health for a full and happy life.” Mr. Daniel says that much of the focus of the Plan will be “on the prevention side.” “Prevention is the cheapest, most effective form of healthcare.” But for preventative healthcare to work in Nevis, the public mind has to be educated about health. Mr. Daniel suggests boldly that there will need to be a “behaviour change” on the island. It will be hard, he says, but “it has to happen.” The health education that Nevisians need won’t just take place at school. Mr. Daniel says the education has to start at home, in families and in communities. The family unit needs to start taking responsibility for the kind of children they are letting loose in the world. Mr. Daniel cautions the single mothers who “celebrate their sons as kings” and spend less time disciplining them. I ask him about the many families in which the parents, together or separate, have two or three jobs each, and therefore don’t have the time to be at home educating their children. He says that with good health and education, their children could get good paying jobs. They could get one high paying job rather than three low paying jobs, and so when it is their turn to be parents they will have the time to teach their own children. “The plan will need to focus on recruiting Nevisians and Kittisians into the health professions. Mr. Daniel says that the mortgage crisis in the U.S. has shown the world that “casino-lead economics” cannot be relied upon. Professions which are of ‘service to humanity” are much more important. He hopes that, with the help of all the families in the Federation, a generation of people who are interested in giving back will emerge. Without the commitment of the people and of the communities, no government project can make it off the ground. Of this particular project, the health Plan, Mr. Daniel says: ‘the people have shown that they want it, and so now it is time for them to take responsibility for what they want.”
