South Sudan should adopt a multisectoral approach, known as the One-Health approach, to mitigate the impacts of climate change, the national minister of Health has said.
Yolanda Awel Deng said on Monday that the mechanism is one of the fruit bearing strategies that the global world is moving toward.
“Multisectoral approach is the new norm right now, this is where the world is going,” said Awel. “The successful countries are the countries that have multisectoral approach. The countries that are making sure their cross-cutting strategies to solving health threat issues in their countries are well incorporated.”
One-Health is a Multi-Sectoral Coordination Mechanism formulated and launched in March 2022 by the government to reduce the risk and mitigate the impact of future emergence of zoonotic, vector-borne and communicable diseases.
The program aims at improving the health status across human, animal, and environmental interfaces by building a resilient multi-sectoral partnership that contributes to effective collaboration and equitable health outcomes.
During a workshop on Monday, the health minister emphasized the need for action and allocation of resources to achieve its goal.
“We need to work together to make sure what we discussed here today is actually translated into action because we have got a modality of speaking, writing a very beautiful documentation but we don’t implement them. Implementation is the way to go,” she stated.
“Like the resources that are contributed in each ministry, there is a portion that is allocated to health factors.”
Awel relates the initiative to the global efforts in finding the solution to the impacts of climate change globally.
“The whole COP28 meeting was concentrated on multi-sectoral approach being the way to make sure that climate impacts crisis that we are experiencing and yet to experience are actually going to be mitigated,” she said.
For his part, Dr Martin Elia Lomuro, minister of Cabinet Affairs and chairperson of the One-Health multisectoral approach said: “Health is one of the highest priorities in the country.”
Lomuro expressed optimism in technical capacity of the team to draft polices that will improve health status of the country.
“We will have very good recommendation that will be applied and implemented for the benefits of the people of South Sudan and the success of One-Health multisectoral system mechanism,” he said.
The call for a multisectoral approach comes amid growing concerns about the impacts of climate change on health and environment such as flooding and wellbeing of the South Sudanese population. The One-Health approach is seen as a key strategy in addressing these challenges.