City hosts delegates of Asia-Pacific conference on public health

KUCHING: It was a lively atmosphere at the Riverside Majestic Hotel here yesterday, where delegates coming for the Fifth Asia Pacific Conference on Public Health 2017 flocked into the registration area on the third floor of the hotel – some still accompanied by their luggage.

Many were seen catching up with friends and their contemporaries in the industry, while several others were catching their breath at a quiet corner and helping themselves to tea and snacks.

The five- day conference – organised by the College of Public Health Medicine, Academy of Medicine Malaysia and commenced with the registration yesterday – is themed ‘Realising the Sustainable Development Goals Aspirations on Health’, which is in line with the healthrelated Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

It comprises keynote address, plenary and symposium sessions, workshops as well as free-paper oral and poster sessions.

It is reported that a total of 650 participants from Malaysia and 20 from other countries have registered for the event.

Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg is expected to declare open the conference during a dinner tomorrow.

Some of the delegates made good use of the time yesterday by signing up for one of the complimentary pre- conference workshops available in the morning.

There were five workshops, which ran concurrently – the ‘Leaders and Advocators for NonCommunicable Diseases ( LeAd NCD)’, ‘ Introduction to Health Risk Assessment’, ‘Getting Your Research Published’, ‘ Modelling Disease Outbreak’, and ‘Improving Public Health Outcomes Under the SDGs Using the Integrated Results Based Management System’.

Those who registered early for these workshops were given a brief overview on LeAd NCD Malaysia, got to learn on ways to publish their research findings after all the hard work that went into them, explored the nitty- gritty of the IRBM system to improve public health outcomes under SDG, and fortified their knowledge and technical capacity in the processes of Environmental Health Risk Assessment ( EHRA).

One of the highlights that the delegates are looking forward to is the keynote address by World Health Organisation ( WHO) Western Pacific region health sector development director Dr Vivian Lin.

The conference is supported by the state government and Sarawak Convention Bureau ( SCB). Collaborators include the Health Ministry, the state Health Department and Universiti Malaysia Sarawak ( Unimas). ( IRBM)