LAC Regional Meeting of the Global Fund begins

Esperanza Martinez, Paraguay’s Minister of Health, and Lelio Marmora, Head of the Global Fund’s Regional Team for Latin America and the Caribbean, participated in the call to order of the meeting, which took place in Asuncion.

“Health policies cannot be made starting with guidelines given by a Minister. Permanent on-going interaction is necessary”, stated Paraguay’s Minister of Health, Esperanza Martinez, in the call to order of the Latin American Regional Meeting for the Country Coordinating Mechanisms and the Regional Coordinating Mechanisms. In addition, Lelio Marmora, Head of the Global Fund’s Regional Team of Latin America and the Caribbean, was in charge of the call to order.

Esperanza Martinez took the opportunity at the call to order to congratulate the Global Fund on implementing the Country Coordinating Mechanism in Latin American countries where they have already been operating for six years in the region. “We have six years of arduous work, lessons learned and political and technical maturity. We have learned by trial and error”, acknowledged Lelio Marmora.

“This meeting allows us to reassess in a favourable light international cooperation” affirmed the Minister of Health who is also the President of the CCM Paraguay. In turn, Marmora referred to the importance of organisation to fight against the current global economic crisis. “The international community is re-evaluating its investment in development, whether or not they should continue investing in AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria and whether or not they should continue investing at a multilateral level". In terms of this situation, she stated that Latin America is one of the regions that “suffers the most from this cutback”.


In the Meeting’s call to order the obstacles that must be overcome were also outlined in order to successfully achieve better performance by the CCMs. “We need strong systems, not strong people. Strong people who assume leadership are not sustainable”, maintained the representative of the Global Fund. And added: “Nowadays, the CCMs are an established reality and have earned their place. The day that we are no longer a part of the mechanism, the mechanism must continue functioning".


By Alejandra Ruffo
Key Correspondents Team – Asuncion, 8/12/09