Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare Dr Shajedul Hasan, Vice President of Developing Countries Asia and External Affairs Africa of GSK Ramil Burden, CEO of Care International UK Laurie Lee, Deputy Commissioner of Sunamganj Sk Rafiq
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and Care Bangladesh, in association the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), Wednesday inaugurated the expansion of Community Health Workers' (CHK) project aiming to enhance women and children healthcare in Sunamganj district.
Organised by the CHK Project, the inauguration programme was held at the Sunamganj Circuit House.
Speakers said that the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) project, which already covered 10 upazilas of the district, will be expanded to all the 11 upazilas.
Speaking at the inaugural function, Vice President - Developing Countries Asia and External Affairs Africa, GSK, Ramil Burden said his organisation is committed to improving access to healthcare and contributing to long-term growth in its partner countries.
"And this could be possible only through an innovative PPP like this one," he said.
When asked, he told the FE that GSK "has a wish to expand the programme across Bangladesh after the success in Sunamganj."
The expanded project will help create a total of 300 private community skilled birth attendants (PCSBA) or midwives and 3700 community health workers reaching out to 1.5 million people.
The project was started in 2012 is part of GSK's 20 per cent profit reinvestment initiative. Under the initiative GSK reinvests the amount of profits generated from its pharmaceuticals and consumer healthcare businesses to build its local profit to support building of health infrastructure in the most underserved areas through innovative partnerships between government, the private and non-government organisations (NGO) sectors, the organisers said.
Joint Secretary of MoHFW Dr Shajedul Hasan was present at the function as the chief guest.
In his address, the chief guest said the project will help strengthen the ongoing medicare support of the government by helping pregnant women and their children.
"In order to reduce the health workforce gap, we require make better use of the existing human resources. Therefore, we are in great need of a project like this one."
"It adopts an innovative approach and has the potential to be replicated across the country," he added.
According to a CARE Bangladesh official, the project cost is nearly Tk 200 million.
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