'Prioritise investments in primary health care for universal health coverage'

New Delhi: The WHO has urged member countries in its South-East Asia Region to increase investments to strengthen primary healthcare as the foundation for universal health coverage and health security, noting that PHC plays a crucial role in enabling better preparedness and response to pandemics.

"We have seen that countries with strong primary health care (PHC) systems were able to respond better and faster to the COVID-19 pandemic, while also maintaining essential services with minimal disruption," said Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director, WHO South-East Asia Region, at a high-level meeting, according to a statement.

The Regional Director was speaking at a high-level virtual meeting that included the health ministers from member countries to commemorate UHC (Universal Health Coverage) Day and launch the South-East Regional Strategy for PHC, the WHO statement said.

At the meeting, ministers emphasised the importance of the PHC approach to achieve UHC and health system resilience.

The Ministers of Health pointed to both the timeliness and value of the Regional PHC Strategy to help drive necessary PHC-oriented transformation across the Region.

The Regional Strategy builds upon examples from practically every country in the Region on efforts to strengthen PHC and identifies a set of 12 interdependent strategic actions to enable countries to strengthen policy, implementation, monitoring and learning for PHC, the statement read. With agency inputs