The Pan American Health Organization today armed Belize with another tool in the effort for better health. It's called the Belize Virtual Health Library, a collaborative program of hundreds of national and regional organizations in Latin America and the Caribbean which seeks to ensure greater access to scientific health information. Today that system was launched in Belize and CEO in the Ministry of Health, Margaret Ventura told us that it should improve the way health care providers in Belize receive and use information.
Margaret Ventura, CEO - Ministry of Health
"Today with the support of PAHO we have what is called the DEREMI Initiative and that is an initiative through the PAHO and World Health Organization across countries to provide a virtual health library for information purposes. The library will be carrying information in our individual countries on health statistics, studies, reports, and up to date information and research on health in Belize.
It will certainly bring together very valuable information for health professionals to be able to make proper decisions on issues challenging the Ministry of Health. Before now, we did have information, not necessarily at the click of a button, but quite often we had to try and compile statistics almost manually in some cases, except for those produced by the Central Statistical Office. But it will certainly provide the baseline data and additional information that we require in the decision making process on a day to day basis when it comes to issues challenging maternal and child health, HIV/Aids, and others. It will provide a golden opportunity to capture and make available comprehensive information on health."
