First Lady arrives in South Africa to attend GBCHealth meeting

First Lady arrives in South Africa to attend GBCHealth meeting

Pretoria, February 27, ZANIS—First Lady Chrsitine Kaseba has arrived in South Africa to attend the Global Business Coalition on Health (GBCHealth) member meeting that will be held tomorrow in Johannesburg.

Speaking during an interview in Pretoria yesterday, Dr Kaseba said she hoped the various business partners will put their resources together in mitigating the negative impacts of maternal health.

Dr Kaseba said the companies being represented at the meeting should come up with a strategic plan on how they would attract funding from donors.

The First Lady was hopeful that the meeting would have a broadest understanding of private/public partnerships so that companies could form a coalition of partners putting together their resources and working through governments to contribute to the health of not only South Africa but Zambia as well.

She noted that private sector involvement in health issues was cardinal considering that it was very costly and there were fewer partners getting involved in issues of health.

Dr Kaseba will be the Guest Speaker at the Global Business Coalition on Health meeting and Parks Tau, the Executive Mayor of the City of Johannesburg will be part of the team that will drive global health in Southern Africa.

The meeting is scheduled to start at 12 hours today and will be hosted by De Beers.

 The robust discussions will include member companies, multilaterals and government leaders on emerging health trends and how they will impact the decisions and actions of today’s’ business leaders.

 GBC Health will also unveil its priorities for 2013 for the Southern African region.

Key discussion items will include how to address health threats posed by agriculture and food security issues, cross sector partnerships among African players, initiatives to eliminate malaria, lessons learnt from effective local programming, and how business can apply its experience addressing infectious of the growing challenges on non-communicable diseases.

Other speakers will include Dr Ahmed Megan,UNICEF Country Representative from Lesotho, Col. Dr Kaka Mudambo, Regional Coordinator , Southern African Regional Network.

And Dr Kaseba is this evening expected to attend a dinner hosted for her by South African First Lady Bongi Ngema Zuma.

GBCHealth is a coalition of more than 200 member companies and organizations committed to investing their resources to building a healthier world…for their employees, for the communities in which they work, and for the world at large, through world-class convening’s, partnership creation, thought leadership and representation in key global health settings.

 GBCHealth is the established go-to organization for companies interested in bringing their assets, skills and passion to the quest for a healthier world.