Since 2011, Daiichi Sankyo has been helping people in remote and impoverished areas lacking developed medical infrastructure by providing them with mobile healthcare services, training healthcare professionals and carrying out health and sanitation awareness activities for local residents. Such initiatives have involved providing vaccinations, antenatal and postnatal care and other mobile healthcare clinic services to residents of Cameroon, Tanzania and India over the last five years (over the last eight years in Tanzania). Meanwhile in China over the last five years beginning in 2015, we have been involved in training healthcare professionals in impoverished areas that are home to ethnic minorities, and have been supporting activities geared to improving health and nutrition of children under the age of five in order to help strengthen the capacity of local residents to address pediatric diseases.

In Myanmar, there is a stark disparity in terms of mortality rates among children under the age of five and among infants under the age of one, with the country’s rural areas incurring approximately double the mortality rates of urban locations. In the geographic area targeted by the project, most of the healthcare facilities are located within the central area. Although rural health centers (RHC) and sub-rural health centers (SHC) are in operation at the rural level in Myanmar, SHCs are assigned one midwife and offer very limited services provided by healthcare volunteers. Against that backdrop, we have been taking steps to improve healthcare access in the region by carrying out initiatives involving mobile healthcare field clinics enlisting the use of vehicles, strengthening the capacity of healthcare professionals and local healthcare volunteers, and implementing activities geared to strengthening the capacity of local residents and heightening their awareness.

Details on the ceremony of services are as follows.

The kickoff ceremony

The ceremony was held in a village situated about 1.5 hours by car from the central area of Nyaung-U where the project is to be carried out. Known as the entryway to the Bagan Zone, Nyaung-U is located some 700 kilometers north of Myanmar’s former capital city Yangon, and was home to the first unified kingdom established by Bamar.. Approximately 150 guests attended the ceremony, including district general administrator, deputy head of the public department, villagers including mothers and their children, members of the mobile healthcare field clinic team, and Plan International staff members.

Events

Initiatives that have been carried out thus far include assessing malnutrition of children under the age of five years old, and performing blood pressure checks and anemia testing for pregnant mothers.

Promoted in conjunction with international NGO Plan International, this project places focus on achieving “Goal 3: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages” of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)*.

SDG Goal 3. Target 2 states that: “by 2030, end preventable deaths of newborns and children under 5 years of age, with all countries aiming to reduce neonatal mortality to at least as low as 12 per 1,000 live births and under-5 mortality to at least as low as 25 per 1,000 live births.”

Plan International provides support to Rohingya refugees and Rohingya children left behind in Myanmar. The Daiichi Sankyo Group approves of Plan International’s commitment to helping Rohingya people and provides its support to such initiatives.

*Adopted by 193 member states of the United Nations in September 2015, the SDGs are a collection of 17 goals consisting of 169 targets aiming to defend our planet by eliminating extreme poverty, inequality, and injustices over the subsequent 15 years to achieve a better future.

Photograph provided by Plan International