April 7, 2006	Friday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 8, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, April 6: The United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID) will provide 60 million pounds by next year to support health and population activities in Pakistan.

Talking to Dawn on the eve of World Health Day, Health Adviser DFID Jane Edmondson said the aim of the department’s health and population activities here was to assist Pakistan to achieve its Poverty Reduction Goals as set out in the PRSP and to fulfil its commitment to achieving the millennium development goals, particularly those directly related to health.

She said in line with DFID’s Pakistan Country Assistance Plan, the approach emphasized on improved service delivery to the poor, within a devolved government structure and recognizing the role of the private sector, social protection and income generation measures that reduced poor people’s vulnerability to health crises; and greater participation of poor people, particularly women, in decision-making at all levels.

Ms Edmondson said the DFID was providing sector budget support to the Pakistani government through the National Health and Population Welfare Facility (NHF).

This is a four-year (2003-2007) DFID initiative to improve the health of poor people in Pakistan.

The NHF supports the Pakistani government to achieve the ambitious targets set out in the national health and population policies and in the Pakistan Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper and specifically addressed low levels of public spending on health and population sectors as a proportion of GDP.

The NHF provides budget support to seven national health and population programmes. They are Population Welfare, Family Planning and Primary Health Care (also known as the lady health worker programme), Tuberculosis, Expanded Programme of Immunization, Aids Control, Malaria Control and Nutrition. It also provides technical assistance to improve policymaking and programme management.

Ms Edmondson said the DFID support aimed at accelerating the reduction in child mortality, and in particular improve the health of newborns, improve reproductive health and especially maternal health, reduce the incidence of communicable diseases, and in particular improve detection and cure rates for TB and slow the spread of HIV infection.

She said the Lady Health Worker programme was close to achieving its target of 100 per cent coverage of its focus population by having in place 100,000 LHWs working primarily in rural areas. Programme staff have indicated that without the NHF they would not have been able to expand their coverage so quickly, nor take on new initiatives such as an increased role for LHWs in polio eradication, TB DOTS and family planning.

She said the DFID, through a consortium of national and international partners headed by the British Council, was designing work on maternal and newborn health within the framework of Pakistan’s new policy on maternal and child health.

The purpose is to improve access and effectiveness of services for maternal and newborn health and care in Punjab and NWFP. Expected health outcomes are: DFID Pakistan provided US$10,000,000 in 2005 as an exceptional one-off grant to WHO to support the national target of polio eradication by the end of 2005.

These funds supported national immunization campaigns focused on high-risk areas and the national surveillance and monitoring system.

DFID will provide $12,600,000 to the WHO’s efforts to support the Pakistan Polio Eradication Initiative in 2006. The initiative hopes to halt polio transmission this year.

She said a joint GoP/donor mission last November mapped out a scaled-up national response to HIV and AIDS.

DFID is currently designing an increased contribution to support the national response. Within this we will be recognizing the case for better integration of HIV and AIDS and reproductive health services.

Deputy Director-General Health Dr Haroon Jehangir and National Adviser National Programme for Family Planning and Primary Health Care Dr Imtiaz Malang, who were present on the occasion, said the Implementation of the National Programme for Family Planning and Primary Health Care was a timely and much- needed response to the health care needs of the rural communities in the country.

The community-based approach is sound. With well-regulated monitoring and evaluation mechanisms and prompt corrective measures to overcome bottlenecks, the programme could go a long way in mitigating the basic health problems of rural women and children.

The programme was formed in 1994 to achieve Universal Health Coverage by addressing primary health care problems in the community and providing promotive, preventive, curative and rehabilitative services and also to expand family planning services availability in urban slums and rural areas of Pakistan.

To achieve the objectives of the programme, Lady Health Workers (LHWs) are chosen from various communities. LHWs are educated and belong to their own communities.