Transcription of interview with Dr. Moussa Mbaye in English

Well, my name is Moussa Mbaye. I am a Civil Administrator and the Secretary General at the Ministry of Health, Prevention and Public Hygiene. I am therefore in charge of coordinating the activities of the various departments at the Ministry. Of course, I also act as an advisor and help with the handling of legal and administrative issues. Because of my position, I was lucky to be involved from the very start with the partnership between the Ministry of Health, Prevention and Public Hygiene and the Ministerial Leadership Initiative. And I also had the honor of presiding over the task force responsible for the content of the program that we developed together. I think it is an extremely important program because it will make it possible for the Ministry of Health to better define certain aspects of our health policy, give managers at the central level better leadership training , and perhaps contribute to the improvement of relationships with development partners, particularly in terms of aid harmonization and alignment, which are key issues. With MLI, we also broached the topic of the multisectorial approach, which should give us the means to ensure that health issues are dealt with holistically by those who get involved in our country.

- [Interpreter summarizes]…

And I also mentioned the issue of aid harmonization and alignment among development partners, and explained that as task force president, I had to coordinate the partnership process.

- [Question in English from interviewer. Why reproductive health?]

Yes… we thought that reproductive health was an issue that should be given full consideration by the authorities and the departments involved with MLI, because it is a key issue. As you know, the improvement of maternal health and the fight against maternal mortality are also part of the Millennium Development Goals, and we are aware that there are difficulties in Senegal that hinder significant progress in this area. Even though some efforts have been made in terms of the supply of services, the establishment of an infrastructure and the recruitment of personnel, there remain difficulties linked to the lack of availability of human resources in problematic areas, and also to constraints of a sociological nature that are responsible for low demand in some areas. We must therefore both continue to improve the maternal health services offered and ensure increased demand -- by encouraging women to use health services. And we think that insofar as MLI helps us to define our health policy, MLI could give us support in this particular area, in terms of strategic direction and implementation of concrete measures.

- [Question in English from interviewer. What specific results are expected from partnership with MLI regarding this topic?]
MM : OK, I need to understand this…
Interpreter : As far as the partnership with MLI is concerned, in what areas do you expect to have positive results?

So, earlier I mentioned the issue of providing reproductive health services. We have made some efforts in this area, but certainly things remain to be done to improve the supply of reproductive health services. And to do so, we must of course continue to invest. Therefore we need additional financial means to invest in reproductive health. This is what I meant earlier when I spoke of improving our health care offering, but we must also perhaps do more in terms of information and sensitization. So, to summarize, we need more resources in order to invest, to establish health structures, to recruit personnel and to train personnel, but also to approach populations, speak to them and perhaps explain to them what is at stake and why they need to go to health structures that can cover their maternal health needs.