The agenda included implementation of the Program for a common social and economic space between Russia and Abkhazia formation, on the basis of harmonization of both countries' legislations, the construction of a cardiology center and a children's hospital in Abkhazia.
The Abkhaz part of the meeting included Minister Tamaz Tsakhnakia, State Secretary of the Ministry of Health Alisa Ardzinba, heads of departments of the ministry and medical institutions. The Russian part - State Secretary - Deputy Minister of Health of the Russian Federation Alexandra Dronova and specialists from subordinate institutions.
Opening the meeting, Tamaz Tsakhnakia thanked Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation for organizational, methodological and practical assistance provided to Abkhazia in the fight against coronavirus infection.
Alexandra Dronova voiced the directions to harmonize the legislation of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Abkhazia: “It is necessary to jointly work on development and adoption of bills on immunization of infectious diseases, on donor blood and its components. It is also important to adopt a normative legal act on the procedure for medical care provision and standards of medical care in general, adoption of rules for determining criteria for assessing the quality of services provided by medical organizations, ” she said.
“We are ready to share experience and provide methodological assistance,” Dronova said.
Tamaz Tsakhnakia noted that these regulations require joint revision.
“We still do not have a law on immunization, but there are separate regulations, in particular, a national calendar of preventive vaccinations for children. But the draft of this law has already been prepared and sent to the RA Parliament for consideration, minister said. - As for donors, there is already a draft law on it, it was adopted by the Parliament in the first reading. There is a number of issues that the Ministry of Health is correcting. "
He also noted that both bills will be sent to Russian colleagues in the near future for review. At the same time, Tsakhnakia added that the Ministry of Health of Abkhazia has prepared two more important bills on tuberculosis and psychiatric services and hopes for an expert assessment of the Ministry of Health of Russia.
The conference participants also discussed the issue of building a modern cardiological medical center in Abkhazia.
“The draft intergovernmental agreement on the construction of the center is ready. There are no conditions for treatment of patients with cardiovascular diseases using invasive technologies. The issue of building a cardiological center is being worked out in detail, it is certainly necessary, " Tamaz Tsakhnakia emphasized.
Minister cited morbidity figures: “More than a thousand patients are treated in the cardiology department of Sukhum clinical hospital every year, of which at least 600 people are with coronary heart disease. 108 children are registered if we talk about congenital heart defects. Most of the patients need high-tech medical care. Therapeutic cardiology and neurology in Abkhazia is at a high level, but we need to reach the level of interventional technologies, ” minister said.
Tamaz Tsakhnakia asked the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation to assist in resolving the issue of accelerating the supply of vaccines against coronavirus infection to Abkhazia .
Alexandra Dronova replied: “We know that the address of President of Abkhazia is in the Government of the Russian Federation. For our part, we support it in every possible way. But we need to give the Government time to make a decision, since we are still in the process of increasing the production of vaccines. Of course, the initial task is to cover the internal needs of our country ”.
The issue of building a children's hospital was also considered within the framework of the Investment Program for Assistance to the Socio-Economic Development of the Republic of Abkhazia.
According to minister, a medical and technical assignment was sent to the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, taking into account the requirements of both parties.
According to Dronova, the document was considered, comments on it will be sent to the Ministry of Health of Abkhazia in the near future.
Following the results of the online conference, the parties thanked each other for the meaningful conversation and expressed their readiness for further interaction in a similar format.