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Health services for children and mothers in Armenia
– Reported, January 22, 2013
Despite progress made in the last years to ensure better health services for children and mothers in Armenia, the quality and accessibility of health services, particularly in rural areas remains poor.
The Government of Armenia has been making concerted efforts to increase public expenditure on health. In recent years there have been steady improvements in this area, however public expenditure channeled from the state budget to health sector as a percentage of GDP is still not sufficient.
The Government of Armenia has taken steps to improve the situation in mother and child health care. In 2003 a ten-year Strategy on Mother and Child Health Care was approved and starting from 2004 the Government has continuously increased the allocation of funds for the procurement of vaccines and injection safety supplies.
In particular:
UNICEF brings in vaccines for Armenian children to ensure that children are protected from vaccine-preventable diseases. Today UNICEF is the major international organization providing vaccines for children in Armenia. UNICEF also supports policy development and trains health workers on immunization and social mobilization to improve coverage.
Jointly with the Ministry of Health of Armenia UNICEF develops policies, strategies and protocols on mother and child healthcare and equips doctors and nurses with knowledge and skills on how to prevent and manage common childhood illnesses, monitor child growth and development, introduce new approaches of mother and child health care.
UNICEF promotes breastfeeding as one of the key pre-conditions for a child to grow healthy and disseminates information on this and other important child care practices to families, communities and other groups.
UNICEF also works to ensure that the population of Armenia is using only iodized salt.
Trainings are provided to health professionals on prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV.
UNICEF supports establishment and functioning of parental educational centers in primary healthcare settings.
CREDITS:
http://www.unicef.org/
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