Africa-Press – Cape verde. Portuguese-speaking African countries are committed to integrating services to respond to challenges in the health sector, such as the increase in chronic diseases, but they face difficulties in terms of information technology and digital technologies, which are essential for this response.
The idea was conveyed by representatives of Angola, Cape Verde and São Tomé and Príncipe, who this Thursday participated in a round table as part of the first care integration summit of the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP), which took place in Lisbon.
Representatives from Brazil and Portugal also participated in this panel.
Helga dos Reis Freitas, national director of Public Health at the Angolan Ministry of Health, acknowledged the importance of integrating health services, but identified some difficulties, starting with population growth, which is increasing at a rate of 3.3% per year, with 60% of the population being young.
The African country is experiencing a period of epidemiological transition, with non-communicable diseases on the rise, while some old problems related to communicable diseases prevail.
Diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular and respiratory diseases and cancer are some of the chronic pathologies that are demanding the most responses from the country in terms of health care.
The same is true in Cape Verde, a country for which the integration of services becomes especially challenging, as it is an archipelago, as stated by Maria da Luz Tavares Mendonça, president of the Cape Verdean National Institute of Public Health.
Telemedicine has been a “very important” tool in this design of “leaving no one behind, no island behind,” he said.
Still in terms of challenges, he mentioned life expectancy in Cape Verde, which is 74 years, and the computerization of services, which is fundamental, but still presents “structural gaps”.
The Minister of Health of São Tomé and Príncipe, Celso Matos, stated that the country is trying to “reverse the gap between the different services: public health, primary health care and hospital care”.
“We still do not have a computerized service, which is of capital importance, and we are now implementing the digitalization of resources, which is in its embryonic phase,” he continued.
Cape Verde and São Tomé and Príncipe are medium-developed countries, while Angola has a low level of development. The classification of the first two ends up making it difficult for them to access financing, as both representatives indicated.
“We may be penalized for our success, as support has diminished,” said the São Tomé Health Minister, noting that, with the decrease in support, progress may slow down.
In relation to Brazil, and in opposition to other countries, one of the problems highlighted was its large size, as Monica Seidi, representative of the Brazilian Ministry of Health, said.
In addition to the “large extension” of the territory, the cultural diversity and the high number of indigenous ethnic groups, with their respective languages, are also challenging aspects for the integration of services in this Portuguese-speaking country.
Álvaro Almeida, executive director of the Portuguese National Health Service (SNS), highlighted the importance of computerization and digitalization in integrating care and welcomed the fact that all participants spoke the same language as a facilitator of the process.
And he acknowledged that, in Portugal, the process that will lead to true integration of processes is long, since organizational integration is already a reality.
The first CPLP Care Integration Summit is part of the 25th International Conference on Integrated Care, which is taking place in Lisbon, organized by the Portuguese Association of Integrated Care.
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