Even in the face of numerous challenges, the public health sector catered to more than 16,Cheap NFL Jerseys,000 women who delivered their babies safely last year. This disclosure was made by Minister of Health, Dr Leslie Ramsammy, during the budget debate on Wednesday when he sought to amplify what he referred to as “the falling infant and maternal mortality rates.”According to him, almost 7,000 women were delivered safely at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation alone. He related that last year the maternal mortality rate was 9.8 per 10,Wholesale Jerseys Authentic,000 births even as he emphasised that it was not long ago that the maternal mortality rate was more than 34 per 10,000 births.“Mr. Speaker, 13 women died during pregnancy and like similar deaths around the world, these were mostly preventable deaths. This is true for the more than 500,000 women who have died during pregnancy around the world last year. While deaths during pregnancy are mostly preventable deaths, we continue to wage a global struggle to end this scourge.”The Minister noted that tremendous strides have been made in Guyana toward reducing maternal deaths to a minimum. He highlighted that the numbers have been reduced by more than two-thirds in less than two decades.And it is a mere three or four of the deaths of pregnant women in Guyana that have been reported in the newspapers, the Minister stressed. According to him, every death is investigated and action taken. Investigators continue to make recommendations and we continue to enforce these recommendations, he added.“Every death of a pregnant woman that occurs in our country is important to us because we believe we have the capacity to prevent most of them. We want to prevent them all. It is the reason why since 2003 there is a permanent investigative team, the maternal Mortality National Committee, to look into those deaths. Over the years, many changes have been made as we try to learn from the experiences of those cases.We will continue to address the issues so that we could achieve optimal outcomes and avoid preventable maternal deaths.”In this regard, the Minister said that the local Health Ministry has led the way in the Caribbean with the introduction of the ALARM programme which was pioneered in Canada to improve Emergency Obstetric Care. According to him, 190 health care providers have been trained through the ALARM programme and Standards of Care have been developed for the pregnant women and a new Perinatal Reporting System is being enforced throughout the health sector.He underscored that clinical audits to ensure that these Standards of Care are being utilised in public health facilities are now being carried out routinely, with the help of the Pan American Health Organisation,Cheap Jerseys USA, the United Nations Children Fund and United Nations Population Fund.“That is the story comrades, the real story of the health workers of Guyana, the real story of the health sector of Guyana. We are proud of the work we do,Wholesale China Jerseys, and we are embarrassed by some of our lapses. We will continue to ensure that we provide our people with fewer and fewer cases where they see us in a bad light.”Last year, he revealed, the infant mortality rate was about 15 per 1,000 births. According to Dr Ramsammy, some will argue that too many babies die locally. But while even greater efforts are required of health workers to eliminate all preventable deaths, the public must also seek to acknowledge the outstanding efforts of the health workers to reduce infant mortality. He said that Guyana is moving from what represented a shameful part of its history when, for example, infant mortality was between 78 and 120 per 1,000 in the late 1980s.He however cautioned that a mortality rate of about 15 per 1,000 is not good enough and must not provide a reason to celebrate.“We must also acknowledge the valiant efforts that have seen Guyana move from close to 100 deaths per every 1,000 infants to about 15. It is a success story that we must not under-state,China Stitched NFL Jerseys, even if we are not where we want to be yet. This is the real story of the health workers. This comrades, is the story of the health sector of Guyana.”The ‘real story’ also is looking at the fact that more than 98 percent of Guyanese children have been vaccinated against 14 deadly diseases that have all been eliminated in Guyana, the Minister related.According to him, coverage for BCG in under one-year-old children reached 98 percent in 2009 while coverage for OPV,Cheap Jerseys From China, MMR and Yellow Fever coverage was 97 percent.“We introduced PCV 7 to reduce pneumonia-like i