19 February 2010
BEIRUT: Municipalities should prioritize urban development and expansion, an official from the Interior and Municipalities Ministry said on Thursday.
“Recent United Nations reports show that more than 50 percent of people in the world live in cities, and the number is expected to rise to 60 percent in the coming two decades,” said Rabih Shaer on behalf of Interior Minister Ziyad Baroud.
Shaer was speaking at a conference ahead of World Health Day, which is on April 7. The conference, organized by the ministries of health and interior and the World Health Organization in cooperation with UN-Habitat’s Towards a Better Urban Future program, was attended by several government and health officials.
“In Lebanon 85 percent of citizens are city residents, which means that the sustainable development of cities should be built on strong foundations,” Shaer said. He added it was impossible to ignore health concerns in a state where half of its people lacked free healthcare services.
“Lebanon used to provide health services for the whole East, but many Lebanese are now struggling to receive healthcare covered by the government,” Shaer said.
“The Public Health Ministry is in need of other players to help it performing its duties. I believe that municipalities should shoulder the responsibility of assisting the Health Ministry in providing better health services for Lebanese citizens.”
Shaer also called on municipalities and municipal unions to take advantage of World Health Day to ban smoking in all public places for one day each year as a prelude to a total ban. “Our struggle against smoking is a battle for the sake of life until the promulgation of a law that bans smoking in public,” he said.
Assad Khoury, director of the Health Ministry’s department for preventative medicine, said that urban expansion was taking a toll on the lifestyle of people. In particular, he noted that the lack of parks and other public spaces made it difficult for people to exercise and walk, activities WHO encourages to prevent diabetes, hypertension and obesity. – The Daily Star
Copyright The Daily Star 2010.
