Ishmael wanted more from Budget

Minister of State in the Ministry of Health and Wellness Davidson Ishmael has praised the Budgetary Proposals and Financial Statement as people-centric, but he is “slightly disappointed” that it did not focus on reducing non-communicable diseases (NCD).

This included the need for more policies to make healthy foods more affordable for Barbadians.

The Member of Parliament for St Michael North raised the issue yesterday during the Budget debate while reiterating the ministry’s concern that “eight out of ten adults in this country are dying as a result of largely preventable illnesses such as diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory illness and, of course, many varied forms of cancer”.

“It is not just the fact that we’re losing citizens, but there is a cost of about $375 million and that can go upwards to $825 million per year, that is spent and allocated towards treating NCDs in our country,” he stated.

Ishmael said these diseases “are largely preventable because they are usually tied to lifestyle choices: how we eat, if we move or don’t move, how active we are, if we smoke, if we drink too much alcohol”.

On the Budgetary Proposals, he said: “If there is one area that I’m slightly disappointed in, in terms of the Budget presentation, I wish I would have heard more relative to how we can work together to reduce these NCDs as an issue.

“But I know that I’ve been working with the Ministry of Finance, and we have tabled a few policies that we will discuss further and I know that with time, and once we work out the metrics – the figures and the dollars and the cents of it all, the economics of it all – I’m sure that we’ll be able to see them come in maybe a future Budget presentation, or even in between.

“But I wish I had seen more relative to how we make our healthy foods more affordable for our people. In his first one, he [Minister of Finance Ryan Straughn] did expand the basket of goods, which included more healthy items.

“And I was hoping to see a continuation of that within this Budget presentation, but maybe in your third one,” he added.

Ishmael vowed to continue having conversations on the issue “because I want to see healthier foods becoming more accessible and affordable to our citizens”.

“Because when we engage with the general populace in Barbados about eating healthily, their first concern, and maybe sometimes their only concern, is the affordability,” he said.

“It is not as affordable, and sometimes we have to educate [them] and show them that if you look at the right items, [if] you look in the right place, you will find that you can access more affordable, healthy items.”

Ishmael praised Straughn’s presentation, calling it one that will in history be “one of the more impactful and transformative Budgetary Proposals that we have heard”.

“If I had to title it, I would call it a people-centric Budget. I believe that this Budget represents that it is not only a Budget of the people, but it is a Budget for the people. The initiatives, the proposals, the programmes that were discussed and presented yesterday [have] people at the centre,” he said. 

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