260111bougainville visits
By Aloysius Laukai

The Division of Health on Bougainville is very concerned at the number of groups entering Bougainville either to carry out awareness on Health Issues and also to sell medical drugs to the stores.

CEO for Health Division, DR. ANTHONY PUMPARA says that his division is aware of these activities but cannot do anything about them until the Health Powers are drawn down to Bougainville.

He told New Dawn FM that many groups are coming from outside and going to the villages instead of reporting to the authorities the purpose of their visit to Bougainville.

The CEO said that once the powers are drawn down, they would make it their priority to make sure that all good friends of Bougainville and NGO follow strict guidelines on how they should operate on Bougainville.

Comments

[Lanbong]

If Dr. Pumpara is "very concerned", he should name these groups. Being "very concerned" is one thing, acting on those "concerns" is another. As the head of Health services in Bougainville,I believe it is within his power and responsibility to address these issues. Please do not wait until people start dying before it is too late. Especially if the drugs do not meet set standards.

For health awareness, if there are sufficient patrols into the rural communities by health staff then I would understand Dr. Pumpara's concerns. There are hardly any health patrols into rural communities, so I think Dr. Pumpara's concern should not be about health awareness into communities by other groups but his division not doing health awareness in these communities. Get out and do health awareness then others won't be doing it for you and you won't be "very concern". "Concerned" without action should not be coming from people like Dr. Pumpara.