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Two years ago, as it struggled to contain the spread of the COVID-19 virus and get people vaccinated, the Government of Jamaica turned to private health care providers for help. The results went well beyond its expectations.
An LHSS grantee in Colombia helps Venezuelan migrants understand how to obtain health services -- while gaining valuable knowledge and skills to strengthen its own organizational capacity.
Colombia ha emergido como líder en la elaboración de políticas que integran a los migrantes a la economía y la sociedad, garantizan su derecho universal a la salud y movilizan recursos nacionales para cumplir con la creciente demanda de servicios de salud.
With a grant from LHSS, the Jamaican health care firm Online Medics is supporting the government’s COVID-19 vaccination effort while gaining valuable new business capacities. “LHSS allowed me to think in the long term – where I wanted my company to go and what I need to do to get it there,” says owner Alex Tracey.
When the next emergency hits, health authorities will have a plan ready to activate.
Since vaccines became available in 2021, only 26 percent of Jamaicans have been vaccinated – a far cry from the country’s goal of 65 percent by March 2022. Religious communities were among the victims of the misinformation causing vaccine hesitancy, with many of the country’s Christians believing the vaccines represented “the mark of the beast.” In response, the government called on church leaders to play a more prominent role in the country’s vaccination effort.
Colombia has emerged as a leader in creating policies to integrate migrants into the economy and society, guaranteeing their right to health and mobilizing domestic resources to meet the increased demand for health services.
Meet Jessica. Her little girl is one of more than 40,000 migrants who have been enrolled in Colombia’s national health insurance system with support from the LHSS Project.
For countries facing a large influx of migrants, the best way to ensure that these new members of society have sustained access to essential health services is to have a long-term strategy – one that builds on existing health platforms.
Population movement of this magnitude places huge stress on health systems in receptor countries. How can health care for migrants be financed? How can health system capacity be expanded? And how can health sector policies and national migration policies be harmonized?
The pandemic has presented an urgent challenge to Colombia’s already overburdened, understaffed health system. Rapid response teams are traversing roads, mountain paths, and rivers to help health officials contain the spread of COVID-19.
LHSS supports scale up and adaptation of existing vaccination programs for COVID-19 while also strengthening countries’ capacity to manage other public health efforts in the future.