A WORKSHOP to consider revisions to the World Health Organisation’s international health regulations was held in Yangon on May 27 and 28.

»Dr Soe Aung

The workshop, organised jointly by the Ministry of Health and the WHO, was part of a series of meetings held throughout the world by members of the UN agency.

Dr Soe Aung, the deputy director general of the Department of Health, told Myanmar Times at the sidelines of the workshop that the purpose of the revisions was to ensure the international community could respond quickly to epidemics, such as those caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and bird flu.

The original regulations were adopted in 1969 and needed to be changed to meet the challenges of globalisation, as well as changes in trade flows, the movements of people, environmental conditions, population growth and life styles.

“The old regulations covered only three infectious diseases – cholera, plague and yellow fever – and there are new diseases emerging,” said Dr Soe Aung.

Dr Soe Aung said that the new regulations would encourage countries to be more transparent in discussing their health problems and the situation of diseases.

Dr Tin Nyunt, the director at National Health Laboratory, told MT at the workshop that laboratories played an important role in analysing diseases, identifying epidemiological data and conducting epidemiological surveillance.

Dr Tin Nyunt said efficient laboratory facilities would also enable governments to counter rumours associated with epidemics.

The assistant director of the Department of Border Trade under the Ministry of Commerce, U Tint Swe, told MT that trade flows could be interrupted by outbreaks of disease that required stringent health security measures.

“We are trying to negotiate ways of ensuring that trade flows are maintained but do not pose a public health threat,” U Tint Swe said.

The Deputy Health Minister, Dr Mya Oo, that the revisions were aimed at providing maximum protection against the international spread of epidemics combined with minimum interference to travel and trade.

The workshop was attended by nearly 30 officials from the ministries of Health, Transport, Agriculture and Irrigation, Hotel and Tourism, Live Stock Breeding and Fisheries, Commerce, Foreign Affairs, Immigration and Population, Office of the Attorney General and the Myanmar Port Authority.