Press Release
A Joint Press Conference held on 29th January, 2008, at the ECO Secretariat to mark the "Global Campaign on Hospitals Safety for 2008-9", which was launched in Davos on 25th January, 2008. The Press Conference was organized jointly by the ECO, WHO and UN/ISDR Offices in Tehran. The ECO Secretary General, WHO Representative in Tehran and Special Coordinator of the UN/ISDR, respectively addressed the media and brief them on the aims and objectives of the campaign.
The Secretary General underlined the importance of the subject for the ECO region which he said, was a disaster-prone area, where maximum awareness of the campaign was needed. He stressed that a culture of disaster management and safety be developed in the ECO countries. The Secretary General briefed the media and representatives of the ECO member states on activities of the ECO in the field of Disaster Risk Reduction. He dilated on cooperation with the relevant international organizations and mentioned the ECO Workshop on School Safety (Istanbul, June 2006), the International Conference on Disaster Risk Managements (Islamabad, October 2007), and the establishment of the ECO Regional Centre for Risk Management of Natural Disasters at Mashhad (September 2007). He also noted a few ECO activities scheduled for the coming months.
The representative of WHO in Tehran made a detailed presentation regarding the campaign, saying that its objectives were beyond the safety of the health facilities. They covered all the relevant infrastructure. He said that the WHO had worked for decades to save the lives of people and mitigate damages caused by disasters. WHO's cooperation with the ISDR in the Global Campaign on Hospital Safety was part of that policy.
He counted ten basic facts to keep hospitals safe from disasters and emphasized that building safe hospitals and health facilities was not costlier. He quoted estimates indicating that the addition of mitigation measures to the design and construction of a new hospital, will account for less than 4 percent of the total initial investment.
The ISDR Coordinator in Tehran, read out the message of Mr. Salvano Briceno, Director of ISDR, in which he elaborated reasons of dedicating the 2008-9 World Disaster Reduction Campaign to "Hospitals Safe from Disasters". He said the objectives of the campaign were to:
1) protect the lives of patients and health workers by ensuring the structural resilience of health facilities
2) make sure health facilities and health services were able to function in the aftermath of emergencies and disasters – when they were most needed
3) improve the risk reduction capacity of health workers and institutions, including emergency management.
The ISDR Coordinator then added that hospitals, health facilities and health services were especially critical in times of disasters. The importance of hospitals and health facilities transcended the direct life-saving role they normally played. They were also powerful symbols of social progress and prerequisites for stability and economic development. He emphasized the need for special attention to ensure their physical and functional integrity in emergencies that, he said, required strong commitment at the highest political level, with sustained support and contribution from all sectors of society.
The Press Conference began with a film on the campaign, showing damages to hospitals and health services caused by recent disasters. The statements and presentations by speakers were followed a questions and answers session. The media persons asked questions about the campaign and various programs made to pursue it. The relevant activities of the ECO Secretariat and the efforts of the Iranian Government to build safe hospitals were explained.
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