Investment in primary healthcare needed for COVID-19 recovery – PAHO Director

As countries in the Americas report severe disruptions in essential primary healthcare services, the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) has cautioned that urgent investment is key to improving health systems continuously weakened by the pandemic.

Director of PAHO, Dr Carissa F Etienne expressed at a media briefing that with cases rising in some parts of the region following a two-month decline, it is vital that countries remain vigilant and prioritise public spending in heath so that no one is left behind.
“Chronic underinvestment has made the Americas vulnerable to COVID-19. Few countries invest as much public spending in their health services as they should, leaving them prone to shortages in health personnel and essential supplies… With financial institutions making loans available and donors pledging support, there has never been a better time for countries to take advantage of these resources to maximise public investment in health,” she outlined.
With the pandemic siphoning financial and human resources, many countries have reported interruptions in vital areas, such as routine immunisation programmes, support for chronic conditions and mental and reproductive health services.
Despite these disruptions, public investment in health has risen in many countries to ramp up ICU capacity, increase hospital services, and deploy COVID-19 vaccines. But these increases cannot be a short-term trend, the Director said.
All countries should increase public expenditures in their health systems to the recommended six per cent of national GDP or higher and should ensure that 30 per cent of this funding goes to first level care.
“Primary care, as you have heard us say over and over again, is the backbone of our health systems. It’s at the primary care level that COVID testing, contact tracking and tracing and immunisations take place…As we learned with COVID-19, health is at the core of vibrant societies. It keeps people working, kids in schools, companies productive and economies growing,” Dr Etienne shared.
Turning to the COVID-19 situation in the region, the Director said that in the past week countries reported 700,000 new COVID infections and 13,000 deaths.
Several countries, including parts of Colombia and Bolivia and the Southern Cone countries, are seeing upward trends after relaxing public health measures.
In the Caribbean, Cuba, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico have reported a drop in new infections while cases are rising in the Dominican Republic, Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados. High numbers of cases are also being seen in the Cayman Islands and Dominica.
Vaccination rates, however, continue to pick up pace, reaching an overall coverage of 48 per cent in Latin America and the Caribbean.
PAHO continues to work with manufacturers to secure additional doses. The organisation has signed supply agreements with three manufacturers of WHO Emergency Use Listing (EUL) vaccines and is in final negotiations with a fourth supplier of mRNA vaccines.