Victoria Falls — Zimbabwe and China have committed to increasing cooperation in the use of traditional medicines to give people more choices in accessing healthcare.
In 2020, China opened the first Chinese traditional medicine and acupuncture centre at Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals which has been offering effective and affordable care to thousands of patients in the country.
Health and Child Care Minister Douglas Mombeshora yesterday met with the Vice Minister of the National Health Commission of China, Dr Yu Xuejun, on the sidelines of the 20th International Inter-Ministerial Conference on South-South and Triangular Cooperation in Population and Development, being held here, to discuss areas of cooperation between the two countries.
The Minister expressed appreciation for China's support to various sectors of the economy as well as the technical support given to the Government which has largely enhanced the country's health footprint.
He said there was more that Zimbabwe could learn from the Chinese in harnessing traditional medicines.
"We are also making strides in strengthening traditional medicine and we now have a council to regulate this sector. Most of our traditional medical practitioners have not gone through formal training so we are trying to put in place regulations to make sure that patients are protected. We understand you are very advanced in the area of traditional medicines and you have hospitals dealing with traditional medicine and we would like to learn from you how you have managed to get that far," he added.
He commended China's support on the construction of the National Pharmaceutical Warehouse (NatPharm), one of the largest warehouses in the Southern African region. The project was funded by a Chinese grant of US$22 million and completed and handed over to the Government last year
The Chinese Government also offered humanitarian assistance towards infrastructure rehabilitation in affected areas to Zimbabwe in the aftermath of Cyclone Idai as well as the extension of scholarships and technical training programmes to Zimbabweans in the areas of diplomacy, health, agriculture, mining, human resources, energy among others.
Vice Minister of the national health commission of China, Dr Yu Xuejun said the bilateral relations between China and Zimbabwe go way back and highlighted four areas of cooperation that needed strengthening.
He said there was need for more cooperation on the deployment of more Chinese medical teams to Zimbabwe that would contribute to the health and well-being of local people.
Dr Yu said the setting up of the centre at Parirenyatwa was a good beginning for cooperation in this respect.
"Alternative medicine has only been introduced in China for 100 years and for the time before that, all the Chinese people relied on the Chinese traditional medicine to treat the people. We believe that there are many culture techniques enshrined in Chinese medicine that need to be advocated and to be made more available to other people," he said. He reaffirmed his country's commitment to further deepening cooperation in the traditional medicine area with Zimbabwe to contribute more to the health and well-being of the people.
Dr Yu said traditional Chinese medicine had a key role in the prevention and recovery stage of the patient.
"The second one is the pair hospital cooperation mechanism. I know that the People's hospital of China Hunan province has established the pair hospital cooperation mechanism with one of the hospitals in Zimbabwe. This will provide professional cooperation with each other and help to solve key problems in key areas." He said.
"The other area of cooperation was the schistosomiasis prevention and control project which started in 2020. I believe that our health cooperation is far more than that and I hope we can work together to implement the consensus made by our leaders and enhance our cooperation in the health sector and we can further have more communication and support with each other."
Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters
Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox
Dr Mombeshora also met with UNFPA regional director for East and Southern Africa Ms Lydia Zigomo where they discussed the progress the country has made in the areas of family planning and provision of services to women and girls.
"We are still a little concerned with the impact, partly of Covid where we have seen an upsurge of gender based violence and child marriages, which is something Zimbabwe had more or less managed to nearly eradicate. So we need to redouble efforts around how we deal with adolescent pregnancies and how we ensure that every young girl has an opportunity to go to school and hopefully achieve their ambitions before becoming a mother," she said.
She said UNFPA was committed to further working with the Government to strengthen work on GBV and ensuring standards that have already been reached in the country were maintained.
