Representatives from Colombia’s Health System and PAHO speak about strengthening risk management in the health sector.

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he Ministry of Health and Social Protection and the PAHO/WHO Office in Colombia recently signed a technical cooperation agreement. The objectives include implementing and strengthening disaster risk management in health and developing the capacities of its professionals in accordance with the priorities set in the Ministry’s ten-year plan for 2012-2021. 

This alliance will make it possible to make an important advance in the development of technical guidelines and operational tools. These will be geared towards generating capacities among the national, regional, and local health system actors, along the lines of safe hospitals in disasters and knowledge of disaster risks.

Other important lines considered are: human resource training for mental health during disasters, management of toxicological emergencies, among others, assessment of at least 15 hospitals and implementation of corrective actions.

Several of the products to be developed are part of the consolidation of knowledge and experience from the Ministry and PAHO/WHO, from the Colombian context, with the intention of making them available to the Americas. Among them:

• Hospital Safety Index evaluation tool for small health institutions (health centers and posts), which will be part of the large and medium tool.
• Update and adaptation of the manual for damage assessment and needs analysis in health.
  
• Hospital guide for disaster risk management and contingency plans.
  
• Technical guide for mass gatherings.
• Minimal humanitarian standards, among others.