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Herald Reporter
Medical research experts have been challenged to come up with innovative strategies to improve the country’s healthcare sector. Health and Child Care Minister Dr David Parirenyatwa told participants at the 20th University of Zimbabwe–University of California in San Francisco (UZ-UCSF) collaborative medical research day in Harare recently that he was convinced scientific research could contribute immensely to health and development. “One of our priorities as a ministry now, is to look at ways of reducing the maternal mortality rate which is very high in the country,” he said. “Scientific researchers have a critical role to play in coming up with innovative strategies of addressing some the challenges facing the healthcare sector.” He added: “You can play a big role to improve personal and community health outcomes.”
Dr Parirenyatwa bemoaned poor funding for research. “This has forced researchers to leave the country and do multiple jobs to survive. The Government has no money but we need to look at ways of improving funding for the sector.”
Dr Parirenyatwa called for collaboration between researchers and Government. “The Health Ministry is not interacting with academic researchers enough. It’s interacting with NGOs only and this is really sad,” he said.
The annual medical research day was held to showcase new technologies and trends in medicine.
Online Reporter