RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

As an­tic­i­pa­tion builds for the up­com­ing na­tion­al bud­get, health stake­hold­ers are call­ing for ur­gent mea­sures to ad­dress wages, food se­cu­ri­ty, and the coun­try’s wors­en­ing health trends.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, Idi Stu­art, pres­i­dent of the Na­tion­al Nurs­ing As­so­ci­a­tion, said nurs­es have been op­er­at­ing on decade-old salaries and ex­pect clear ac­tion in the bud­get.

“We want to see the com­mence­ment and com­ple­tion of ne­go­ti­a­tions for nurs­ing and mil­i­tary per­son­nel as we con­tin­ue to op­er­ate on 2013 salaries,” Stu­art ex­plained. “We want a clear in­di­ca­tion with­in the bud­get that ne­go­ti­a­tions are to be­gin.”

Stu­art not­ed that in meet­ings last week with both the Min­is­ter of Ter­tiary Ed­u­ca­tion and the Min­is­ter of Health, the as­so­ci­a­tion out­lined over 22 ar­eas of con­cern, in­clud­ing mo­tor ve­hi­cle tax ex­emp­tions for trav­el­ing nurs­es—a ben­e­fit re­moved in 2015 by the PNM. He al­so called for fi­nan­cial sup­port for nurs­ing stu­dents, who face mount­ing costs that he says have con­tributed to low­er pass rates.

On a broad­er scale, Stu­art stressed the im­por­tance of es­tab­lish­ing a Na­tion­al Health Ac­cred­i­ta­tion Coun­cil to in­de­pen­dent­ly re­view all health fa­cil­i­ties, pub­lic and pri­vate, en­sur­ing they meet in­ter­na­tion­al min­i­mum stan­dards. He al­so high­light­ed the need to ad­vance the long-de­layed na­tion­al health in­sur­ance sys­tem.

For­mer pres­i­dent of the Phar­ma­cy Board Glen­wayne Su­chit, mean­while, said sup­port for small farm­ers must be seen as a health in­vest­ment. “With re­gard to food se­cu­ri­ty, re­liance on long, com­plex glob­al sup­ply chains makes com­mu­ni­ties vul­ner­a­ble to shocks like pan­demics, cli­mate dis­as­ters, and geopo­lit­i­cal con­flict. Sup­port­ing lo­cal small farm­ers builds a re­silient re­gion­al food sys­tem that can con­tin­ue to feed peo­ple dur­ing crises,” he said.

He added that small farm­ers strength­en lo­cal economies and com­mu­ni­ty co­he­sion. “Small farm­ers are com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers. Mon­ey spent with them cir­cu­lates lo­cal­ly, strength­en­ing the rur­al econ­o­my. This cre­ates jobs and fos­ters com­mu­ni­ty co­he­sion. Fur­ther­more, a con­nec­tion to lo­cal food and land has been shown to have pos­i­tive ef­fects on men­tal and so­cial well-be­ing.”

Su­chit al­so warned against los­ing tra­di­tion­al di­ets and agri­cul­tur­al knowl­edge. “Small farm­ers are of­ten the cus­to­di­ans of seed va­ri­eties, agri­cul­tur­al knowl­edge, and tra­di­tion­al farm­ing meth­ods that have sus­tained pop­u­la­tions for gen­er­a­tions. These tra­di­tion­al di­ets, of­ten based on whole, lo­cal foods (eg, the Mediter­ranean di­et), are now recog­nised by sci­ence as among the health­i­est in the world. Los­ing small farms means los­ing this in­valu­able cul­tur­al and health her­itage.”

He called for Gov­ern­ment in­vest­ment in pro­cure­ment pro­grammes, fi­nan­cial in­cen­tives, re­search, in­fra­struc­ture, and fair mar­ket ac­cess.

“View­ing small farm­ers as a pub­lic health tool re­frames the de­bate. It moves sup­port from be­ing an agri­cul­tur­al sub­sidy to a pre­ven­ta­tive health in­vest­ment. The mon­ey spent sup­port­ing a de­cen­tral­ized, di­verse, and sus­tain­able agri­cul­tur­al sys­tem pays for it­self many times over by re­duc­ing fu­ture health­care costs, avoid­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal dam­age, and build­ing health­i­er, more re­silient com­mu­ni­ties,” Su­chit added.

Mean­while, Steven Lalchan, a mem­ber of the Pri­vate Phar­ma­cy Re­tail As­so­ci­a­tion, al­so urged the Gov­ern­ment to take ac­tion on lifestyle-re­lat­ed ill­ness­es. “We eat too much fried food and car­bo­hy­drates. We need to en­cour­age healthy di­ets, ex­er­cise from kinder­garten right through adult­hood, and reg­u­lar doc­tor vis­its — not just when we get sick,” Lalchan ar­gued.

He warned that chron­ic ill­ness­es like di­a­betes, heart dis­ease, and de­pres­sion are reach­ing epi­dem­ic pro­por­tions and called for pre­ven­tion pro­grammes to take pri­or­i­ty. He al­so sug­gest­ed tax­ing fast food prof­its heav­i­ly. “Any com­pa­ny mak­ing over $500,000 in prof­its from fast food should be taxed at least 50% be­cause their prod­ucts are dri­ving up hos­pi­tal costs,” he said.

Lalchan fur­ther pushed for in­vest­ment in agri­cul­ture to im­prove di­ets and food se­cu­ri­ty. “The more peo­ple plant, the more whole foods they eat, the bet­ter it is for the coun­try,” he said.