WHO commends health minister

RIYADH: The World Health Organization congratulated Health Minister Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah yesterday for being responsible for completing a safe and successful Haj season without endemic and pandemic diseases.
In a personal message addressed to Al-Rabeeah, the WHO highly commended the preventive and curative health care services provided by the Ministry of Health in looking after millions of Haj pilgrims this year.
The WHO also said that the ministry had harnessed facilities and services of the Ministry of Interior, the National Guard and the the Saudi Red Crescent Authority to offer the best health care services to the pilgrims.
In a statement made earlier, Al-Rabeeah expressed his ministry's keenness on preserving pilgrims' health and well-being. He recalled that a comprehensive health plan was executed under the guidelines of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah and Crown Prince Salman, deputy premier and minister of defense.
“We have mobilized all human, financial and technological potentials and capabilities for the provision of preventive, curative, ambulatory and health awareness services,” the minister said.
Under the program, he said the ministry intensified early epidemiological surveillance at all ports of entry through 16 health control centers.
In addition to the national medical cadres, the ministry also benefited from the experience of WHO specialists to serve the pilgrims. Such services include taking samples from patients and conducting the necessary tests at MoH laboratories, besides sending samples to be tested at international laboratories.
Other factors contributing to the success of the ministry program included the establishment of East Arafat Hospital, which has a bed capacity of 236, including 50 intensive care beds and 30 emergency beds.
It is one of the large-scale health projects established under the direction of King Abdullah.
The ministry also provided curative and therapeutic services through its cardiology, dialysis, digestive endoscopy and intensive care units available at hospitals in Makkah, Madinah and King Abdullah Medical City in Makkah. During the season, 362,740 pilgrims received medical treatment from various facilities of the Ministry of Health. The number of pilgrims who underwent heart catheterization surgeries stood at 463, of which 35 were open-heart surgeries. There were 2,024 dialysis operations. Under the medical convoy program, the number of pilgrims who were moved from the hospitals of Makkah and Madinah to hospitals in Arafat to help them complete Haj rites stood at 443.
As part of its awareness program, the ministry transmitted more than 2 million messages to the mobile phones of people in the two holy cities with the help of the three major mobile operators, namely, STC, Zain and Mobily.
The messages contained relevant Haj information for pilgrims and others in Makkah and Madinah.