Honourable Ministers
Distinguished Representatives
Dr Shin Young-soo, Regional Director, WHO Western Pacific Region
Representatives of agencies of the United Nations, intergovernmental organizations and nongovernmental organizations
Ladies and gentlemen:
I welcome you all to the sixty-eighth session of the WHO Regional Committee for the Western Pacific.
As outgoing Chairperson of the Regional Committee, I have the honour to express again the appreciation of fellow Health Ministers and Representatives to the Minister of Health of Australia and the Australian Government for the extraordinary welcome and reception we received this morning.
This will be an especially memorable session of the WHO Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, not just for the terrific venue and beautiful city in which we meet.
This week, the WHO Director General Dr Tedros will be addressing this Regional Committee for the first time. As with any change at the top, a new Director General brings new directions, new ideas, and a new style of leadership – we are looking forward to the opportunity to engage with Dr Tedros on his vision for WHO later this week.
Excellencies:
We gathered last year at the WHO Regional Office in Manila and tackled an ambitious agenda. It is my great pleasure and honour to be able to report to you on some of the progress that has been achieved since we last met.
Distinguished colleagues:
At our last session, last year, the Regional Committee endorsed the Regional Action Plan for Dengue Prevention and Control. In line with the Action Plan we adopted, countries are now being supported by WHO to update their own national plans. For Pacific island countries, training on capacity-building in integrated vector management was conducted in Fiji this year.
In China, Malaysia, Fiji, Singapore, Vanuatu and Viet Nam, pilot projects for dengue vector control using Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes are ongoing. WHO continues to support Member States' capacity strengthening in diagnostics, case management and risk communications in line with the Regional Action Plan.
Last year, the Committee also endorsed the Regional Action Framework for Malaria Control and Elimination in the Western Pacific (2016–2020). Since then, as with dengue, the Framework has been used to update national strategic plans. On the strength of these, seven endemic countries eligible for funding from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria have submitted concept notes for continued funding in the next cycle.
A regional meeting to strengthen surveillance of malaria control and elimination was conducted this year and countries are currently engaged in surveillance capacity strengthening – which we know is a crucially important part of malaria control efforts. WHO continues to support country capacity for malaria diagnostics through refresher training and external competency assessment. Monitoring of antimalarial resistance through therapeutic efficacy surveillance continues in endemic countries; and a regional workshop on updating national treatment guidelines was also conducted this year.
Climate change and environmental issues affect all of us. A year ago, the Committee endorsed the Western Pacific Regional Framework for Action on Health and Environment on a Changing Planet. Recent progress has contributed to the key objective of the framework: to accelerate action on health and the environment to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
Six countries have initiated large-scale national projects to build climate resiliency into health systems—with components of legislation and policy-making, digitized information and surveillance, and improvement of service delivery and hospital safety. WHO has provided support to countries in: (1) the mainstreaming of Water Safety Plans into the water distribution systems of 9 countries ; (2) training on the ratification process and implementation of the Minamata Convention on mercury exposure for 18 countries ; and (3) addressing asbestos and other occupational hazards in four countries, through provision of the evidence base for regulation, and training in awareness-raising.
Also, last year, the Committee endorsed the Regional Action Agenda on Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals in the Western Pacific. The Regional Monitoring Framework for the SDGs and universal health coverage has since been further advanced with technical guidance and a baseline report.
Delivering on the SDG agenda will require new partnerships and new ways of working, beyond just the health sector – because the health-related SDG goals and targets are so closely interlinked to the overall SDG vision of inclusive and sustainable development. We saw this approach in action last year at the ninth Global Conference on Health Promotion, as well as in forums such as the Asia Pacific Parliamentarians Forum on Global Health.
Another priority in this area is on integrating an equity focus into health programmes, including through service delivery models which are gender- and equity-focused. If we are truly going to deliver on the vision of leaving no-one behind, we must ensure our health programs and services work for everyone.
Last but not least, health security threats are inevitable – and we must remain ever vigilant. The Region’s vulnerability was again highlighted by a range of health security events over the last year, particularly threats to human infection from A/H7N9 and other avian influenza viruses, dengue virus, Zika virus with associated clusters of microcephaly and Guillain–Barré syndrome, as well as natural hazards from typhoons and tropical cyclones.
Last year, the Committee endorsed the Asia Pacific Strategy for Emerging Diseases and Public Health Emergencies, or APSED III. In a context where health security and the health security threats we face are constantly changing, it was important to update our common framework of preparedness and response, and our region-wide strategy for meeting the core capacity requirements of the International Health Regulations (IHR).
APSED III incorporates the Monitoring and Evaluation Framework for the all-important IHR core capacities. Five Member States in this Region have already completed a Joint External Evaluation or JEE, with several more countries in the pipeline. Post-evaluation, countries are supported to complete their national action plans within the APSED III framework.
APSED III is also the framework for delivering the WHO Health Emergencies programme, established in 2016, in this Region.
Excellencies:
This year we have an even busier agenda ahead of us. As always, I look forward to the opportunity to exchange our views and experiences, and to refine our approaches to the complex issues that we will discuss this week.
We meet against the backdrop of terrible natural disasters, conflicts and political instability in other parts of the world. We may not be able to solve all the world’s problems this week, but we should always keep in mind the noble goal which brings us together: advancing the health and well-being of the people of this vast and diverse Region.
I would like to thank the Vice-Chairperson, the Honourable Nandi Tuaine Glassie, Minister of Health of the Cook Islands, for taking the Chair while I was absent last year – and the other office bearers for their excellent support.
Finally, thank you to Regional Director Dr Shin and your staff, for the excellent organisation and management of this meeting and for your hard work since last year – which supports us to make sustained progress on our health agenda.
Thank you.