Guyanese are living longer and fewer mothers and children are dying, President Irfaan Ali announced Saturday night at a flag-raising ceremony held in Linden to usher in Guyana’s 58th Independence anniversary. He said that from 2020 to now, the country’s life expectancy has increased by two years overall to 70 in males, and 74 for ...

On Friday, 17 May 2024, the Healthy Caribbean Coalition (HCC) and partners hosted a webinar entitled ‘Caribbean Mobilising to Eliminate Industrially Produced Trans Fats’, it convened key regional stakeholders to discuss the elimination of industrially produced trans fats (iTFAs) from the Caribbean food supply. iTFAs are a significant contributor to cardiovascular diseases, causing around 278,000 deaths globally each year.

In 2022, CARICOM member states committed to removing iTFA from the food supply by December 2025. Momentum is building across the region as countries begin work in this area with the support of key regional partners. Civil society has an important role to play in supporting these efforts.

Funded by a grant from Resolve to Save Lives (RTSL), HCC has undertaken an initiative which aims to support civil society advocacy and increase public and policymaker awareness for regulatory policies to eliminate partially hydrogenated oils (PHOs) and limit iTFAs to no more than 2% of total fat in all food products. This webinar was a crucial step in building momentum and support for iTFA regulation across the region

Webinar Goal and Objectives

The goal of this webinar was to build regional support for the accelerated enactment of regulatory policies in CARICOM Member States to eliminate iTFA from the food supply.

The objectives of the webinar were to:

• Sensitise HCC’s stakeholders about the HCC Civil Society iTFA Advocacy Project.
• Build awareness about iTFAs, their associated health dangers and presence in the Caribbean food supply.
• Showcase global best practices and lessons learned in iTFA regulation.
• Build awareness of regulatory approaches and pathways for the elimination of iTFAs in CARICOM, and in doing so, highlight the feasibility of introducing iTFA regulation in the Caribbean.

Sponsors and Partners

This webinar was implemented with the support of RTSL, in partnership with CARICOM, the Caribbean Public Health Law Forum, the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the OECS Commission, the Law and Health Research Unit (LHRU), the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Barbados (HSFB), Healthy Bahamas Coalition (HBC), Heart Foundation of Jamaica (HFJ), Lake Health and Wellbeing and the St. Lucia Diabetes & Hypertension Association (SLDHA).

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BRIDGETOWN – A recent study has found that despite modest improvements on last year, food insecurity in the English- and Dutch-speaking Caribbean remains persistently higher than pre-pandemic levels, driven by the cost-of-living crisis, global economic volatility and the lingering impacts of the pandemic. The Caribbean Food Security and Livelihoods Survey, carried out jointly by the ...

Submitted CVs will be reviewed to ensure they meet the selection criteria and if successful they will be placed in our consultant database. Please note that consultants do not need to be based in the Caribbean but must meet the selection criteria outlined below. The database will be the first resource we turn to when consultancy opportunities arise.

Please see below selection criteria.

1. NCD Prevention and Control Expertise including any or all of the 5*5

a. 5 NCDs: cardiovascular diseases, cancer, diabetes, chronic respiratory diseases and mental health and neurological disorders; as well as the 5 main NCD risk factors: tobacco use, harmful use of alcohol, unhealthy diet, insufficient physical activity, and air pollution.

2. CARICOM/Caribbean Expertise

3. Area of Expertise

a. Healthy Food Policy*

b. Tobacco Control

c. Alcohol Control

d. Physical Activity

e. Mental Health

f. Cervical Cancer control

g. Multisectoral/ multi stakeholder responses/mechanisms for NCDs*

h. Commercial Determinants of Health (Good governance, conflict of interest management, countering policy interference)*

4. Special Skills within the context of NCDs

a. Communications*

b. Public Relations (PR)*#

c. Public health writing (Op Eds etc.)*

d. Law and NCDs (including human-rights based approaches)

e. Meaningful Engagement of People Living with NCDs*

f. Meaningful Engagement of Young People*

g. Strategic Planning*

h. Monitoring and Evaluation*

If you are interested, kindly submit your CV to HCC at hcc@healthycaribbean.org with the subject: HCC CALL FOR CONSULTANTS. In the body of the email please indicate your area of expertise, any special skills and your location. Please submit your CV by 31 May 2024. If you miss this call, we will be sending out further calls in the 3rd quarter of 2024.

*Current priority needs.

The post Call for Consultants appeared first on Healthy Caribbean Coalition.

Longtime People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) member, Amna Ally on Monday appeared to be recovering from serious heart and kidney complications, well-placed sources said. Ms Ally, a former PNCR General Secretary who was recently embroiled in a public spat over her disappointment with party leader Aubrey Norton’s performance, has been hospitalised for the past two ...

The number of dengue fever cases in Guyana is rising, prompting Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony to Tuesday urge people who have a fever to go to a doctor as a precaution against the potentially deadly disease. “If you have a fever, we are encouraging people to come to one of our facilities so that ...

An Air Europa passenger jet — en route from Lima, Peru to Madrid, Spain — made an emergency landing at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) on Monday afternoon because one of the passengers fell ill, officials confirmed. “The aircraft declared a medical emergency on board and as such, an emergency landing was instituted. The airport’s ...

The Ministry of Health on Saturday denied an allegation by opposition APNU+AFC parliamentarian, Christopher Jones that several nurses of the Campbellville Health Centre fell ill. “At the time of discovery, no staff reported any adverse health effects,” the Health Ministry said in response to Mr Jones’ claim on Facebook that ten nurses from the Campbellville ...

Guyana on Friday launched the Global Strategy for Cervical Cancer Elimination, saying with officials saying that the country has embarked on a countrywide campaign to vaccinate persons against the human papilloma virus (HPV) and screen persons for cancer caused by that virus. With Guyana currently having 40 percent HPV vaccine coverage, Director of the Ministry of ...

This groundbreaking initiative kicked off on Sunday, April 6, ...