Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
At the recent G8 meeting just a few days ago in Halifax, which is preparation for the event coming up in June, I noticed that part of the communiqué that came out mentioned that the Minister of Health from Mali was with the ministers there. The ministers “commended those partner countries that are investing directly in building effective health systems in order to make integrated primary health services available at the community level”.
When I go back to the remarks in your opening statement, Ms. Biggs, you mentioned part of the data that came out: three million babies dying in the first week of life, nine million children in the developing world dying before their fifth birthday. The causes, largely preventable, include pneumonia, diarrhea, malaria, acute malnutrition, measles, HIV.
To the question from my colleague Mr. Abbott a few moments ago on micronutrients, there was the response about the impact of zinc in helping to mitigate diarrhea. You mention in your report some successes that Canada has already had. I picked up on Mali, because in western Mali we have a program training health care workers. That has had the kind of impact where now over half the births are attended by a trained health care worker. In Guatemala we are working with the faculty of obstetrics and gynecology. I believe we have trained 700 health care workers there to assist in births. Another success was working with UNICEF on vitamin A and iodized salt.
I wondered whether you might take a moment to expand on any or all of those types of initiatives that have proven very effective in helping reduce child mortality and improve maternal health.