Functional units have been set up to deal with new threats – Dr. Fong

We have set up functional units to deal with threats that are new.

Permanent Secretary of Health Dr. James Fong stated this when questioned on the readiness of the Ministry of Health to combat any new pandemic or threats to Fiji adding one is the Border Health Protection Unit and the Command Centres to protect within the borders.

Dr. Fong says the other thing they have set up are Command Centres for surveillance.

He says what they want is for these Command Centres to conduct surveillance and response without any input from the top, so that their local action and surveillance starts first before they get notified about the problem.

The Permanent Secretary says once all that is done then all the Ministry does is coordinate the various responses to ensure that the Command Centres are adequately resourced.

He says this is how they have built their system post-COVID.