Congress Must Make Health Workers and COVID-19 Emergency Funding the Priorities

By The Editorial Team, IntraHealth International Dr. Sissoko is the head of anesthesiology and emergency services at a hospital in Mali. Photo by Nana Kofi Acquah for IntraHealth International.December 08, 2020In letters to US Congress members this fall, Léonie Claudine Lougue (Minister of Health of Burkina Faso) and Michel Hamala Sidibe (Minister of Health and Social Affairs in Mali) called for a united response to the COVID-19 crisis.“We respectfully request that the U.S. Congress support partner countries’ own leadership in building and strengthening the health workforce and cross-cutting health system capacity to respond to COVID-19 and to prevent, detect, and contain future infectious disease outbreaks,” they wrote.“Continued leadership from the U.S. government and international cooperation across countries are necessary to ensure that all people around the world are safer and more secure from global health threats.”Read their full letter below.At least44,000 health workers in Africa,12,000 health workers in Asia, and570,000 health workers in Latin America and the Caribbean have been infected with COVID-19, threatening their lives and overall health system capacity.Ninety percent of countrieshave experienced disruption to essential health services, with low- and middle-income countries reporting the greatest difficulties.And even before the pandemic, the world faced a global shortage of 18 million health workers by 2030, mostly ...
Source: IntraHealth International - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: COVID-19 Policy & Advocacy Health Workforce Systems Health Workers Source Type: news