Press Release - Dr. Trevor Hassell

A Caribbean academic is urging regional governments to increase collaboration with the international

community to enhance measures to prevent the adverse effects of both communicable diseases and the

importation of chronic diseases into the Caribbean with the consequential health and economic burden

on regional economies.

Former Adjunct Professor of Medicine, University of the West Indies, , and Honorary Consultant Physician

and Cardiologist, Dr Sir Trevor Hassell said the regions economies lack in many instances the funding,

technical support and sometimes the expertise to combat the negative impact of diseases; and therefore

there is a need for enhanced levels of support for these Small Island States of the Caribbean from the

international community.

Very often, when we discuss the communicable and non-communicable diseases we do so almost

exclusively from the health perspective with emphasis on sickness and death, but these diseases have a

significant adverse impact on development with the potential to slow or reverse the gains achieved in

the region over the past several decades. There is therefore a need to convey to the international

community that the issue of communicable and non-communicable diseases requires special

consideration in the particularly vulnerable countries of the Caribbean, he said.

Dr Hassell noted that the international community should assist countries in the region in the

development, implementation and sustainability of best practice disease monitoring and surveillance. .

He said it is important that the international community become aware of the tremendous susceptibility

of the region to both communicable and non-communicable diseases and lend technical support to the

region to make the people of the region less susceptible and vulnerable with the taking of swift measures

to prevent these diseases entering the region from developed countries.

Dr Hassell, who is also President of the Healthy Caribbean Coalition: a civil society regional alliance for

combating chronic diseases, charged that the region is also facing specific challenges due to globalization.

He said many chronic diseases have proliferated in the region as people adopt the living habits of

individuals in developed countries.

Thus by way of example, said Dr Hassell, some40 years ago, there were very few fast food restaurants in

the Caribbean and sugar sweetened beverages and ultra-processed foods were not consumed to any

appreciable extent. However presently, there is a proliferation of fast food restaurants and the

consumption of sugar sweetened beverages and ultra processed foods has increased exponentially

leading to obesity and resulting chronic diseases., , he added.

The doctor argues that in order to combat the occurrences of these illnesses, Caribbean countries need

to come together and work more effectively as a region with greater support of PAHO/WHO and

adopting a whole of society approach that includes, governments, the private sector and civil society

working together. He cautioned that in collaborating in efforts to prevent and control chronic diseases,

there was need for transparency and sensitivity of conflict of interest issues.

Sir Trevor Hassell was speaking ahead of the World Alliance for Risk Factor Surveillance (WARFS) Global

Conference to be held in November 2015.

The 9th WARFS Conference will be hosted by American University of Antigua College of Medicine (AUA)

on the beautiful twin island state of Antigua & Barbuda.

The conference is themed: Risk factor surveillance in the 21st century - Consolidating the past looking

into the future.

Other topics to be discussed include:

The role of big data and risk factor surveillance ethical concerns, technical issues.

Is the traditional epidemiological view of surveillance valid in the 21st century?

Are we caught in traditional thinking? The role of positive health.

How can NCD surveillance assist in major communicable disease outbreaks?

Inequity in capacity how to enhance capacity in developing countries.

The conferences keynote, plenary sessions, and concurrent presentations will be held November 18-20

at the Sandals Grande Resort Antigua.

For more information on the conference please visit http://www.warfs15.com.