USM President and Dean, seminar speakers and representatives of UNESCO St. Maarten and BAK.
POND ISLAND--University of St. Martin (USM) can play an important role in society by providing the country with certified programmes for health educators and workers.
This was one of the messages delivered by Head of General Health Care at the Health Ministry’s Collective Prevention Services (CPS) Maria Henry, to participants of USM’s second public seminar, “Towards a Healthier and More Sustainable St. Maarten,” held at the institution last week Thursday.
About 100 persons attended the seminar in person and more than 450 watched it via Facebook Live. USM hailed the event a success.
Speakers included Henry, American University of the Caribbean (AUC) School of Medicine representative Dr. Golden Jackson and liver cancer survivor Rose Rumnit, who is knowledgeable about detox. Secretary General of the Ministry of Public Health, Social Development and Labour VSA Joy Arnell delivered introductory remarks. Speakers engaged with the audience to explore ways in which the community can raise awareness of UN Sustainable Goal #3 – health and wellbeing.
During the event, Dr. Jackson outlined the steps that AUC faculty, staff and students took to contribute to sustainable health conditions in the country. “Reduce, recycle, re-use because our health is in great part shaped by our environment,” Jackson said referring also to post-hurricane recovery efforts.
Rumnit made the link between good health and “going back to our roots.” She praised the works of Denicio Wyatte and his Eco-St. Maarten Agricultural Research and Development Centre, who spoke at the first USM seminar in September. “To have a healthy diet, we have to do agriculture,” said Rumnit, who expressed her willingness to offer workshops on natural medicine at USM.
Commenting on the number of attendees, USM President Dr. Antonio Carmona said the large turnout was due to a number of significant factors. He said health concerns everyone and everyone knows that there is a lot to do to improve conditions in St. Maarten. “Secondly, working closely with BAK and UNESCO, our Dean of Academics Dr. Rolinda Cater pulled together an excellent panel of women from civil society, government and academia, who have influence over how we think about health. And finally, it was the presence of such notable foundations as Positive (Foundation), Diabetes Foundation of St. Maarten, Kelaha Projects on Cervical Cancer and St. Maarten Sickle Cell Foundation.”
CaniTV, a media project linking St. Maarten to West Africa on social issues, was responsible for the Facebook live streaming of the university event. “All these factors and collective efforts contributed to making our second seminar a grand success,” Carmona said. “We hope to build on this experience and pull together the country’s resources to ensure that USM continues serving the country.”
Prime Minister Leona Romeo-Marlin joined the audience for the entire evening.
