Chief Medical Officer Dr. Nick Gent has called for an end to unaffordable care in the Cayman Islands, saying that “poverty is causing people not just to be selective about what care they can afford to receive, but often that they are choosing not to seek any care at all”.
Speaking at the annual Cayman Islands Healthcare Conference, which took place 17-19 Oct. at The Ritz-Carlton hotel, Gent said that there were “ingrained faults in the way that we offer care – or more correctly fail to offer care – and that this failure is affecting a very large number of people”.
He added, “The cost, or fear of the cost, of healthcare is now a major barrier to many people … We have a very imbalanced healthcare system, one in which the systems that care for wealthier clients does so at the expense of the poorest.”
Missed diabetes and hypertension means that people often are diagnosed only when diseases become chronic, by which point it can often be too late.
One solution, said Gent, is to adopt the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO) HEARTS programme in the Cayman Islands, which keeps healthcare costs down and allows treatment by pharmacists as well as doctors. He also called for more effective food labelling to tackling the continuing problem of obesity, including the adoption of the CARICOM system which clearly states if a food item is high in fat, sugar or salt.
On the subject of vapes, he warned that they were being targeted at children and that legislation needs to be updated to make sure vape manufacturers did not get around tobacco control laws. He also recommended the creation of a comprehensive cancer registry.
Also speaking at the conference was the Rachel Corbett, national epidemiologist in the Ministry of Health and Wellness, who introduced some of the findings from the 10-yearly STEPS survey on the nation’s health.
Like Gent, she said that there was “a notable amount of undiagnosed ill health in the Cayman Islands” and that people “are not receiving the right care that they need and we’re losing them along those care pathways”.
Revealing the latest obesity statistics, Corbett said the survey showed little has changed over the last 10 years, with 69.6% of the population overweight or obese in 2023, compared with 70.6% in 2012.
Around 41% of men and 33% of women in the Cayman Islands are overweight, according to the STEPS survey, but in the obese category, 41% of women are obese, while 25% of men are, the same pattern as in 2012. 31% of men and 25% of women are of normal weight.
Speaking to the Cayman Compass, Corbett said that the obesity situation was “not reassuring – it’s at a bad, bad point,” and the fact that very little had changed since the previous survey in 2012 meant that “we’re not reaching out to the right people and we’ve got to change our approach.”
Also speaking at the conference was Sabrina Turner, Minister for Health and Wellness, and Deputy Governor Franz Manderson. Manderson credited his attendance with helping save his life after a heart attack.
“Two and a half years ago,” he told delegates, “I was at the gym exercising on the treadmill and I felt a pain in my chest. Earlier that year, I was at this conference and I heard it said here, do not ignore the signs of your body. Well, that pain in my chest turned out to be a heart attack. But because I was here and because of the information shared here, I did not ignore it. I got to the hospital and I’m here. So if there was any doubt about the importance of this conference, I think me being here is testament.”
The findings of the 2023 STEPS survey will be published in full in December.
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