Healthcare systems need to be more resilient against future pandemics: HMC expert

It is highly important for every country and individual to keep enhancing resilience and preparedness in the healthcare sector against any future disasters as the world is entering the Covid-19 post-pandemic era, a senior official of Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) has stressed."Disasters such as pandemics are unpredictable and we don’t know if we will have a pandemic in a year or two. So, it is very important that all countries, including Qatar, continue investing in prevention and keep enhancing resilience and preparedness. Otherwise, we will find ourselves in the same square again,” cautioned Dr Abdullatif al-Khal, deputy chief medical officer, HMC.Dr al-Khal was addressing the media on the sidelines of the Middle East Forum on Patient Safety 2023 that took place recently. Resilience in healthcare was the focus of the forum this year and Qatar’s response and resilient approach to the Covid-19 pandemic was a major point of discussion at the forum.Highlighting the need to be vigilant and alert against any outbreak of a pandemic, Dr al-Khal - who is the chairman of the National Pandemic Preparedness Committee - as well as senior consultant, Infectious Diseases and head of Adult Infectious Diseases Division, HMC, noted that humans tend to forget the past events soon."As human beings, it is easy for us to forget quickly the disasters that we went through and this should not happen. The world should learn and remember what all the countries across the globe went through in terms of suffering and pain because of Covid-19. This must be a learning lesson for the international community and everyone must work and be focused on avoiding such disasters again,” explained Dr al-Khal.The official also highlighted that "we should always keep up the response and preparedness against any future eventuality". "There should never be any lack of preparedness. Whatever strength, whatever resilience and whatever capacity that is in place is always needed to face such disasters. We should all be more focused and we should bear in mind the lessons learned from the Covid-19 pandemic. Every country should make sure that the response to the pandemic should actually continue,” added Dr al-Khal.