Healthcare in Belize
[1] The MoH offers affordable care to a majority of Belizeans with a strong focus on providing quality healthcare through a range of public programs and institutions.
A formalized assessment of the health sector was not approved by the Government of Belize (GoB) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) until 1994.
[1] The results revealed a number of problems surrounding the health sector and identified key policy areas and priorities for improving the healthcare system.
The issues identified in the diagnostic report laid the foundation for government initiated Health Sector Reform Project (HSRP), which was implemented in 2000.
[10][11] A separate agency within the Social Security Board has been established to oversee the financing and purchasing duties for the NHI fund, while the MoH remains in charge of the regulatory and policy-making functions.
Primary objectives of the plan include: expanding BHIS coverage to rural areas, strengthening the registration system, and improving data security and health information privacy.
This creates problems in fully assessing the standard of healthcare in Belize and thus delays medical statistics requested by the United Nations and other interested parties.
Mental Health services are also provided in the acute psychiatric ward in Belmopan Hospital, located in the Western Region.
[9][17] In terms of medical staff, there are two psychiatric nurses allocated to provide mental health services in seven of the eight district hospitals.
[17] The government of Belize, with assistance from the European Union and United Nations, has undertaken a major restructuring of the healthcare system.
Today, the private sector provides some additional tertiary care and imaging services not available in the public system.
La Loma Luz Hospital is a private institution run by the Seventh Day Adventist mission.
Since the independence of the country in 1981 and with the collaboration of UNICEF and PAHO, important measures have been settled to improve the child’s health in Belize.
Not only age, gender-based, geographical areas, ethnic groups, poverty, violence, but also natural disasters and climate change are the main risk factors for social disparities in access to health services and quality of care.
The Country Programme 2017- 2021[22] initiated by the Belizean Government and UNICEF, aims to implement more coherent interventions, including a focus on: In 2016, the Global Burden of Disease Collaborative Network reported that the prevalence of overweight in children aged in 2-4 reached almost 19% in Belize.
Moreover, Cayo, Orange Walk and Toledo districts also face an increase of early childhood overweight and obesity, even in rural areas.
Media and advertising also play their role by encouraging family to buy high fat and sugar products and beverages.
The local beliefs and social norms of associated the body size as a health status indicator might influence overweight on children.
In 2018, UNICEF recorded that 1/3 of children from Toledo District present a stunted growth, and most of them are part from the Maya peoples or Garifuna communities.
To address the nutritional issues in Belize, the Minister of Health (MoH) with the support of UNICEF, establish a new Strategic Plan based on a life cycle approach.
The plan aims to settle actions focusing on: Despite a number of challenges, the Belizean government has made significant changes to the healthcare system.
As a result of these changes, Belize has shown marked improvements in a number of areas, including vaccine preventable deaths.
