Global event to showcase Bangladesh’s e-health capacity begins in Dhaka Tuesday

Bangladesh will host the first inter-country conference on “measurement and accountability for health” in Dhaka from Tuesday.

Senior Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 25 April 2016, 07:20 PM
Updated : 25 April 2016, 07:33 PM

The two-day event would bring “global health gurus” together with development partners.

“This is a proud moment for us that we have been selected for hosting this conference,” said Prof Abul Kalam Azad, an additional director of the government’s health directorate.

He has been overseeing the health department’s entire management information system since 2009.

At a press briefing on Monday, he said the ‘Global Health Data Collaborative’, which was launched by the UN on Mar 9, had chosen Bangladesh to hold the first such conference in Dhaka.

This was because Bangladesh had “broken the barrier of fragmented data system for health and could make a wonderful solution to bring all the stakeholders in one platform to electronically flow and share their data from a common and integrated national health information system”.

“And all development partners agreed to convene in Dhaka to see how we did that. This is a great recognition. We’ll showcase our stories in the two-day conference,” he said.

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The Data Collaborative was launched with the UN Office of Statistical Commission by over 20 development partners in line with the new SDGs stressing measurement and accountability.

Its purpose is to help countries build capacity to measure progress of all health-related SDGs.

Prof Azad said Bangladesh had been featured “prominently” during the launching.

“The official website launched on the same day published very prominently the logo of Bangladesh government as a partner. No country in the world has a logo there,” he said.

He said the WHO, on the same day, made the launch “the top story on its headquarters website and featured Bangladesh as a content of this story”.

“In our conference we will also show how all the stakeholders - government, private sector, NGOs, development partners work together for a common and integrated health information system,” he said.

Over 600 participants from at least 60 countries are expected to join the conference.