Dominica presents Health and Environment Assessment to CARICOF
The Honourable Minister for Health and Environment, Dr. Kenneth Darroux, presented the Caribbean Climate Outlook Forum (CARICOF) with a Health Vulnerability and Adaptation Assessment which was completed last year.
CARICOF is intended to identify gaps in information and technical capability; facilitate research cooperation and data exchange within and between regions, and improve coordination within the climate forecasting community.
The forums are critical building blocks in the Global Framework for Climate Services of the World Meteorological Organization.
The assessment is collaboration with the Ministry of Health and Environment, the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology, the Pan American Health Organization, the World Meteorological Organization and Health Canada.
The concluded Climate and Health Vulnerability and Adaptation Assessment is considered by the Hon. Minister for Health as the cornerstone for mainstreaming climate change adaptation in the health sector.
“The study has put in focus the overwhelming vulnerabilities of the local population to the impact of climate on vector-borne diseases.
Food safety, food security and water quality and the necessity to build adaptation measures into health programme, planning and implementation. It draws on the need to be climate smart when building health systems and providing health services,” Dr. Darroux stated.
Chief Medical Officer, Dr David Johnson revealed that the Ministry of Health also conducted a review in December with the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) based in Trinidad.
“The after-action review which was done in September in addition to the formal assessment focused on different elements of emergency response including preparedness, alerting, response, recovery and rehabilitation. It examined what was expected to happen, what actually happened, what went well and why and what can be improved and how.
“With the expected increases in the these events, the country therefore needs to position itself to better respond to public health threats associated with climate variability and change by incorporating systems to provide better information for decision-making in health service delivery.”
Dr. Johnson stated that Dominica must establish the resources to continue the study on the country’s vulnerability to climate variability and climate change.
These studies will assist the Government in establishing systems which will inform decisions on adaptation to reduce public health threats which are expected to arise as a result.
