Harmony and Action in the Caribbean

A population made up of indigenous people, escaped African slaves, French, Spanish and English colonialists, Creoles (mix of Europeans and Africans), Javanese, East Indians, and then sprinklings of Jews, Chinese, Brazilians and a few others – what language do you imagine they might speak?

Why Dutch, of course. This is Suriname, now independent of the Netherlands. It wasn’t always a Dutch colony. In the 17th century the English got New Amsterdam from the Dutch and the Dutch got Suriname from the English. Who got the best of that deal? New Amsterdam, of course, became New York.

Check the map. Suriname is up there on the Caribbean coast of South America between French Guiana and (British) Guiana. It’s capital as every school child knows, well some do, is Paramaribo.

Suriname is special not only because it is the only Dutch-speaking country in South America but it has a population of just over 500,000 and vast swathes of pristine tropical forest. Like much of South America it has a chequered past. But it is now a democracy. I was there, at the invitation of PAHO (Pan American Health Organization), because the government of Suriname has taken on board the importance of social determinants of health and action through, Health in All Policies (HIAP).

Francoise Barten, who I met first at the People’s Health Assembly in Cuenca, Ecuador in 2005, was there to greet me on behalf of PAHO.

The government really are engaged. After a meeting with the Minister of Health I was hosted by the Speaker in the House of Assembly, the Parliament, and gave a lecture to the House on social determinants of health. The next day, at a big national meeting, especially big for a tiny country, the Vice-President, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of Health and Speaker of the House were all there. I have been invited to give a keynote address before, with ministers on the platform. They usually give their speech and leave. A noble exception was the Swedish Minister of Health. This time the ministers all stayed at least for the morning session.

I was also hosted by the Suriname Medical Association and the Faculty of Medicine and gave a talk on The Health Gap.




Above: With First Lady of Suriname, Liliane Ferrier, and Guillermo Troya, PAHO Rep in Suriname

I met the first lady who is leading a country-wide initiative on early child development. We had a good meeting. The First Lady said that she was also the champion across government for HIAP. I told her that I think Suriname is showing the way on whole of government action on SDH. Impressive.

With the First Lady at our meeting was psychologist, Liliane Ferrier who had said to me publicly at the big meeting: I have been waiting for you in Suriname for 25 years!

A little insight into the country. The doctors gave me two books by a Surinamese novelist Cynthia McCleod. McCleod? In Suriname? A little research revealed that her unmarried name was Ferrier and she was the daughter of a President of the country. Liliane is a Ferrier. Any relation? Yes. First cousin. The former President was her uncle. Liliane’s background included Jewish, Chinese, and a lot else besides, including time spent in the Netherlands.

There is great willingness and interest on the part of government to be active on social determinants of health. An important step is good documentation of the extent of inequalities in health and in the determinants of health.

We may well do some work with them in evaluation of their initiatives on early child development.