Project News

The Partnership Project for Global Health and Universal Health Coverage (GLO+UHC) conducted a mission to provide technical support in revising Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Handbook of Myanmar from 18 to 22 February 2019 based on a request of Myanmar Ministry of Health and Sports (MoHS). The mission team consisted of three Thai government officials and one Japanese expert from GLO+UHC.

Under the GLO+UHC, there is a component related to MCH and it is called "Universal Health Coverage for Children and Mothers (U4C)". The aim of the component is to develop Thailand-Japan success model for child health via achievement of UHC and disseminate it in the ASEAN. GLO₊UHC works in collaboration with UNICEF East Asia and Pacific.

Recently, Thailand and Japan developed thematic papers to introduce selected MCH experiences in the context of UHC and disseminated for the first time at 11th International Conference on MCH Handbook held in December 2018. One of the speakers for our panel discussion was from MoHS and she invited Thai experts to attend technical consultation meeting for Basic Health staff to discuss the revision of current MCH Handbook. The objectives of this mission were (1) to understand current situation related to MCH in Myanmar, (2) to share Thai experiences related to MCH Handbook with MoHS, (3) to discuss next steps on technical cooperation between Myanmar and Thailand, and (4) to understand the broad flow and necessary steps in the process of providing technical assistance to other counties.

The mission team attended the technical consultation meeting and shared their experiences on the policy implications, development and management of MCH Handbook in the context of UHC in Thailand. They also had several consultation meetings with major development partners in working in the area of maternal and child health in Myanmar to understand current challenges in the area of MCH in the country. GLO+UHC continues extending support to Thai government in supporting other countries in improving MCH in the context of UHC.