His Excellency Dr. Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al-Rabeeah, Minister of Health, stressed that addressing the issue of non-communicable diseases, their prevention methods, and cooperation among countries in this respect are top priorities on the Kingdom's agenda in the Sixty-fifth World Health Assembly, currently taking place in Geneva during 21–26 May 2012.
"Out of its deep experience, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has proposed an initiative on the crowd medicine, and held a conference under the patronage of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin AbdulAziz Al Saud two years ago where all international conferences including World Health Organization had participated," said HE Minister of Health, currently presiding the Kingdom's delegation in the World Health Assembly. The Sixty fifth meeting of the World Health Assembly, HE Minister of Health noted, will endorse the Saudi proposal.
The initiative calls for the creation of a training program (under the theme Crowd Medicine), with its headquarter in the Kingdom to benefit from its expertise in the health medical services offered for pilgrimages as a model to be followed for all human gatherings, in addition to holding a conference on the Crowd Medicine every three years in cooperation with the Kingdom.
"The WHA meeting has issued some recommendations which were approved by the Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean, the Arab Ministers of Health, the Executive Office of the WHO," said HE in a statement to Saudi News Agency.
He said that the Kingdom has also put forward an initiative to combat blindness, and called upon the world to adopt several recommendations to reduce rates of blindness in the world. Concluding his statements, Minister of Health asserted that the Kingdom is deeply concerned with a number of issues already on the agenda of the World Health Assembly, including maternal and child health, best health finance means, Millennium Development Goals, and cooperation among countries to fight infectious diseases, especially in poorer countries.