Ministry of Health Meeting
Earlier this week, we were fortunate to meet with the Principal Secretary for the Ministry of Health in Zanzibar, Dr. Mohamed Saleh Jiddawi. We wanted to meet with him in order to have a better understanding of the regulatory processes our eventual device will go through before implementation. A former resident of Boston, he was very excited to see “his friends from the Green Line.” We were informed of a number of issues of Zanzibar’s health climate that mirror the issues we have learned of from our data collection. One staggering fact was that fifty percent of births on Unguja occur in the lone referral hospital, Mnazi Mmoja. This explains the overcrowded nature of the hospital and the biggest flaw in the local referral system. As far as making sure our device passes regulation, Dr. Jiddawi suggested we consult the Tanzanian Food and Drug Administration (TFDA), Zanzibar Medical Research & Ethics Committee (ZAMREC), and the Zanzibar Food & Drug Board. He did propose that permission from these organizations would be easier to achieve if our device is non-invasive and if we can ensure mothers will accept and use it. Once we gain permission from those organizations to use our device in the country, the Ministry of Health will help us distribute and implement our device in health facilities in Zanzibar.
