News
Health ‘Peace-Keepers’ Needed For Indigenous Health, Doctors Group Says |
| Spokesperson: | Australasian Faculty of Public Health Medicine (AFPHM) |
| Date: | Monday, 25 June 2007 |
| Category: | Aboriginal & Indigenous Health |
| The Australasian Faculty of Public Health Medicine (AFPHM) has strongly supported the Federal Government's response to the report Little Children are Sacred. The Faculty of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) represents New Zealand and Australian public health medical practitioners. Faculty President, Professor George Rubin said the AFPHM has pledged its doctors to assist the Government in establishing ‘public health peace’ in remote communities. “We welcome the desire of the Australian Prime Minister and the Minister for Indigenous Affairs to protect Australia’s Indigenous women and children from alcohol abuse, violence, sexual abuse and disease,” he said. “The Faculty notes with concern the persistent public health problems that account for a difference in life expectancy of 17 years between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. “The Faculty stands ready to assist – by sending doctors, developing public health recommendations and supporting others – in remedying these atrocious problems. “The Faculty pledges its 770 members to assist in improving the health of Indigenous Australians (and to the improvement of the health of the Maori people in NZ) in close consultation with the communities themselves. “Improvements in the public health conditions under which many remote and Australian Indigenous communities operate need urgent and sustained attention. Securing the supply of fresh food, clean water, immunisation and rapid and effective treatment for childhood conditions such as middle ear infection, pneumonia and eye disease are critical. “Assessing the health status of Indigenous children is one step – perhaps the first – in assuring that these longer term public health travesties are set right. This must link with vast, sustained improvements in care. “These communities are starved of every type of health service that people who live in Australia’s large cities take for granted - GPs, nurses, allied health workers, dentists, diabetes educators and drug and alcohol workers. “These people are the ‘peace keepers’ who are necessary once the work of law enforcement and legislation is complete. “Several Indigenous communities have shown leadership already in relation to the problems to which the federal government is responding. Wisdom suggests that we determine what has led to these successes and apply it elsewhere.” Media information contact: Rachel Gleeson on 0408 639 697 or (02) 9256 9602 |
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