DEVELOPMENT OF HEALTH SERVICES

The health planning advisor, Jack Sims, is knowledgeable, speaks Arabic, dedicated, and has won the confidence and respect of MOH senior officials. The assumption that a one year assignment for Sims would be adequate has proven to be totally unrealistic. Creating awareness of the importance of health planning and establishing a planning unit from scratch is a tough, complicated task, even over a three-year period. Administrative delays due to the bureaucratic structure of the SARG as well as the lack of suitable, qualified personnel are delaying the project. Therefore, the Mission recommends extending the services of the health planning advisor for two more years, as well as the training of three additional participants for the MPA degree and the provision of urgently needed commodities such as calculators and at least one utility vehicle. The design of the health survey was approved in 1/78. Originally, the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) was to administer the survey. However, after CBS revealed the high per diem supplementation which it would require for the CBS interviewers, the MOH decided to assume full responsibility for the survey. Consequently the initial survey will be smaller than planned. This change, however, could be a blessing to the MOH in the long run in that the MOH must now develop its own capabilities, instead of relying on the CBS for the design, field testing, implementation, data analysis, and evaluation of a continuous health survey. Furthermore, as this capability develops, the MOH will in a position to survey the entire country (13 Mohafazats), instead of five Mohafazats as currently planned for the present survey. With the shift of responsibility for the survey from the CBS to MOH, the services of the Health Survey Advisor, Cathy Connolly, should be extended another year and four more vehicles should be provided.