Tufton pushing for radical changes in public health
Published:Friday | November 17, 2023 | 12:07 AMChristopher Serju/Senior Gleaner Writer
Jamaica is, perhaps, experiencing the greatest transformation in public health since it gained independence in 1962, according to Minister of Health and Wellness Dr Christopher Tufton. The country, he added, is poised to undergo further transformative changes, some of which are facing significant pushback from people who are set in their ways.
“The issue around getting a mindset change in how health care should be positioned – both from the practitioner’s position and also from the patient’s stance is the biggest threat we face in the health space as we move to engage these additional expenditures around upgrading and renewing is the change-management function that is required,” he told Wednesday’s opening ceremony of the 14th staging of the three-day National Health Research Conference at the AC by Marriott, New Kingston.
“. I could talk to you about advancing nursing practitioners. We will be going to Cabinet soon to give them limited prescriptive rights. A lot of people don’t agree with this, a lot of doctors feel like it should never happen. It happens in other countries,” he declared.
The minister continued: “It requires a kind of mindset adjustment. Nothing is wrong with having concerns and hedging and managing those concerns, but we can’t be, ‘No, it can’t happen because it never used to happen’. I could talk about the role in pharmacists becoming a more critical part of the ecosystem of responding to health concerns. Whether it is administering vaccines, as in some jurisdictions, and the question is, ‘How do we get our pharmacists integrated into that overarching concern of being more responsive to a population that has far more challenges’?”
Tufton went on to point out that this was the first time since Independence that so many resources have been allocated to rightsizing the health sector and that this was reflected in a number of areas.
Referencing the engagement of numerous doctors and nurses, as well as other health professionals, he said: “The human element was woefully inadequate when compared to the demands on the system, and again I say I don’t know of any other time in the history of public health when you could take out a 14-page list of doctors and 720-odd of them are now going to be hired to complement the staff that currently exists.”