Last week, President Paul Kagame called malnutrition in the country a ‘self-inflicted’ challenge that needs leaders’ special attention. Kagame, who was speaking at the launch of the fourth edition of Rwanda Integrated Household Living Conditions Survey ‘EICV’ 2013/14 in Kigali, stressed that failure to eliminate poor nutrition was a result of carelessness. “I think, to some extent, this is out of our own carelessness, to some extent, self-inflicted, and I have to tell our leaders here that we will have to pay attention to this and make sure that we eradicate it because we have the tools to do that,” he said, calling on officials to pull up their socks in fighting malnutrition. In a similar development, Dr Solange Hakiba, the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Health, emphasised need for public health system alertness to contain disease outbreaks. Citing the Ebola scourge in West Africa, Hakiba said that absence of effective systems to contain such diseases could ravage communities. She made the remarks in Huye District recently during the White Coat Ceremony (WCC) for 128 third-year medical and clinical students from UR’s College of Medicine and Health Sciences (CMHS). WCC marks medical students’ transition from a pre-clinical stage of learning to clinical health sciences. The ceremony is intended to prepare professional doctors through providing students with well-defined guidelines regarding the expectations and responsibilities of the medical profession. Hakiba told the students that transitioning from pre-clinical to clinical world marks the beginning of a life of responsibility. Meanwhile, the newly- opened University of Global Health Equity (UGHE) Rwanda is expected to integrate development strategies into the health sector. Owned by Partners In Health (PIH), an international non-profit organisation, the university was officially inaugurated at a function in Kigali recently, with 26 students admitted for the inaugural master of science in global health delivery (MGHD) degree. Over 160 students had applied to join the new higher learning institution to get involved in principles of health equity, incorporating the latest advances in education technology Minister for Health, Dr Agnes Binagwaho, who is also one of the senior lecturers at the university, said she was passionate about integrating development into the health sector. Dr Papias Malimba Musafiri, the Minister for Education, also expressed optimism that the university will contribute towards the achievement of the country’s Vision 2020 in building science, technology and innovation. In the same week, Rwanda joined the rest of the world to celebrate the International Ozone Day. Organised under the theme, “30 Years of Healing the Ozone Together”, the Rwanda Environment Management Authority (REMA), in collaboration with Rwanda Medical Council, called upon local media to contribute to raising people’s awareness on the dangers of excessive exposure to ultra-violet (UV) radiations on health and how ozone protection activities can prevent diseases such as eye cataracts and skin cancers.
