PAHO Director, Dr. Mirta Roses, met with Colombia’s new Minister of Social Protection, Mauricio Santamaria, and offered the support of the Pan American Health Organization to the new ministerial management.

The minister said that in his country’s Congress a project to divide the Ministry of Social Protection is advancing, and they request PAHO’s technical cooperation in this new stage. “We reaffirm our commitment to PAHO and our interest in working on the issues discussed here,” sustained Santamaria in relation to the topics discussed at the meeting of PAHO’s 50th Directing Council.

“We have the institutional memory and a panorama of lessons learned to offer,” Dr. Roses pointed out, and stressed the importance that supporting Colombia, a State that forms part of the PAHO’s Committee and is one of the eleven founders of the Pan American Sanitary Bureau, has to the Office.

Health systems and services, institutional reform, telemedicine, and approaches to public health are among the topics expected to be addressed.