At the thirty-ninth regular meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) on 4-6th July, leaders made a commitment to tackle non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the Caribbean.
Six priority areas were endorsed. These included:
- Establishing and maintaining a smoke-free status for the region
- Implementing policies geared to preventing childhood obesity including health-promoting school environments and improving front-of-package labelling
- Promoting the elimination of cervical cancer
- Support for mitigating post-disaster vulnerabilities related to NCDS, particularly nutrition, treatment and care
- Increasing international financing and technical support
- Strengthening accountability through national coordinating mechanisms
Leaders of the Caribbean discussed the upcoming UN High-Level Meeting on Non-Communicable Diseases which will be held in September. The theme of this meeting is: scaling up multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral responses to the prevention and control of NCDs. It was felt that CARICOM member states should be well-represented at this meeting especially as, in 2007, CARICOM led the way on NCDs by hosting the first ever summit on NCDs. This put the spotlight on this area leading to NCDs being included on the UN Development Agenda.
About CARICOM
The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) consists of a group of 20 states, from the Bahamas in the north to Suriname and Guyana in the south, working together under four main pillars: economic integration, foreign policy coordination, human and social development and security. You can find out more about the work of CARICOM here.
More Information
For more information about the 39th Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of CARICOM held in July you can visit their website here or you can watch the videos below.
Opening Ceremony of the Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government
Closing Press Conference of the Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government
Picture Credit: CARICOM
