Sixty-fourth World Health Assembly

At the Sixty-fourth World Health Assembly in Geneva, MLI staff and senior representatives of all five MLI countries met to talk about ways of advancing country ownership.

The health ministries from Ethiopia, Mali, Nepal, Senegal, and Sierra Leone are working on a document that they hope to release at the Global Health Council conference next month.

At the meeting on Tuesday in Geneva were  four Ministers of Health:  Honorable Minister Tedros of Ethiopia, Honorable Minister Madeleine Ba Diallo of Mali, Senegal’s Honorable Minister Fada, and Honorable Minister Zainab Bangura of Sierra Leone. Secretary of Health and Population, Dr. Sudha Sharma, represented Nepal’s Honorable Minister Shakti Bahadur Basnet.

Dr. Francis Omaswa, MLI senior advisor and ACHEST executive director, emphasized the importance of leadership in ministries of health. He said that without leadership, health system strengthening would flounder. Minister Tedros seconded Dr. Omaswa’s statement, adding: ”Change is about leadership. You cannot make progress in what you do without it.”