Health Bureau announces ambitious plan to improve health by 2030

The Health Bureau (SSM) has drafted a plan to improve local health with ambitious goals to be achieved by 2030.

The plan was unveiled yesterday morning in a meeting that was also to commemorate the 20th anniversary of when Macau’s policies to become a “Healthy City” were established.

As Alvis Lo, the director of SSM, mentioned in his initial speech, this new plan is deeply rooted in, and inspired by, the country’s general plan of “Healthy China 2030.”

Lo also mentioned that both “Healthy China 2030” and the local plan consider global strategies and frameworks formulated by the World Health Organization (WHO) and other international organizations, adjusted for Macau.

The plan is “based on long-term planning, strengthening top-level design, and mobilizing public participation,” Lo said, adding that it “includes policy directions, action strategies, specific goals, and evaluation indicators.”

Taking the health of the local population as its core value, the plan “combines resources in the fields of health, education, culture, sports, and other fields; integrates health elements into all public policies; and cooperates with the development of the macro-health industry of the SAR government,” the same official remarked.

The full plan has 20 specific goals and 52 evaluation indicators “that need to be achieved by 2030,” covering areas such as health risk factors, mental health, chronic diseases, and infectious diseases.

“We hope that, by 2030, Macau can achieve [these goals]. The overall aim is to improve health literacy, popularize healthy lifestyles, control major chronic diseases, and continuously improve residents’ quality of life,” the SSM director concluded.

20 very ambitious goals

As the director of SSM noted, the plan includes 20 goals “to be achieved by 2030,” although, on closer inspection, they may be too ambitious.

Some examples include, “eradicate the epidemic of HIV/AIDS,” “eradicate hepatitis types B and C” and “lower consumption of tobacco and alcohol.”

Other examples include “contain the growing trend of obesity,” and “accelerate the eradication of cervical cancer.”

To achieve such ambitious goals, the SSM has identified three major challenges including “inadequate practices of a healthy life,” “increase of risk of chronic diseases,” and “growing demand for health services.” To address such challenges, the government drafted three political guidelines, “decentralize resources from the hospital to the community,” “change the paradigm from healthcare to health management,” and “change the mentality from a passive health management to an active one.”

With these three orientations in mind, the authorities aim to develop another three implementation strategies that include the “elaboration of health policies that will improve the system and services,” “create a healthy environment to mobilize the participation of the community,” and, “promote healthy behaviors to achieve health self-management.”

In his speech, Lo noted that such directions directly emanated from the words of President Xi Jinping who pointed out that people’s health should be strategically prioritized to promote the construction of a healthy China. This includes five key areas: popularizing healthy living, optimizing health services, improving health security, building a healthy environment, and developing health industries.

Big health challenges are mostly preventable

The director of SSM believes that, although there are some challenges in the implementation of the health plan, most of the “big issues” are preventable.

“With the urban development, aging population, and lifestyle changes in Macau, chronic diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and cancer have become the most important health challenges in Macau,” Lo said, adding that such factors are “causing the demand for medical services to continue to rise and becoming a problem for Macau residents, representing the main cause of death.”

“Fortunately, most chronic diseases are preventable. We can prevent the occurrence and development of chronic diseases and reduce the negative impact on residents’ health by formulating healthy policies, building a healthy environment, and helping residents practice healthy behaviors,” he remarked.

During several presentations from the six specialized workgroups, which followed the general presentation of the plan, hypertension was cited as an example. According to these presentations, similar to other countries and regions internationally, there is a high incidence of the condition in Macau but, unlike in other places, in Macau the condition is more concerning because many people do not know about it.