UK Delegation to visit Nicaragua
NSCAG News |
on: Thursday, 5 February 2015
From 15-23 February, a delegation from the West Midlands region of UNISON and the George Eliot Hospital NHS Trust will be visiting Nicaragua for meetings with the health union FETSALUD. The main purpose of the visit will be to sign a twinning agreement, the first of its kind, between George Eliot Hospital and the Nilda Patricia Hospital in Ciudad-Sandino, Managua. The aim of the agreement is to promote co-operation and understanding of partnership working and will provide an opportunity for a mutual exchange of advice and expertise in order to better overcome the challenges faced by both partners. The visit will also provide an opportunity to further strengthen relations between the West Midlands region of UNISON and their counterparts in Nicaragua.
Members of the delegation are Roy Emblen, UNISON Deputy Convenor at George Eliot Hospital, Dr Sebastian Yuen, consultant paediatrician and Mark Glover, International Officer, UNISON Solihull Branch.
The programme for the visit will include visits to maternity centres, women’s hospitals, children’s hospitals and rural and urban health centres and will enable the delegation to witness at first hand the advances made in health since the return to power of the Sandinista government in 2007.
A return visit to the UK from FETSALUD, sponsored by UNISON’s International Development Fund, is planned for April this year.
Dawn Downes, UNISON Branch Secretary said: “The project and the twinning agreement is not just a symbolic gesture. It will hopefully recognise the support our teams and organisations can give to our Nicaraguan partners, but will also provide us with an insight into the Nicaraguan health system, so that we can also look at any of their ideas which might work here”.
