KINGSTOWN, St Vincent (CMC) – Four Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries have been chosen to conduct social marketing training and technical assistance to reduce daily salt intake.
The project in Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, St Vincent and the Grenadines and Jamaica, is being led by the Pan-American Health Organisation (PAHO) Salt Smart Consortium, acting as the secretariat, supported by Healthy Caribbean Coalition (HCC).
Technical support is being provided by the University of South Florida and World Health Organisation (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Social Marketing and Social Change.
The Ministry of Health, Wellness and the Environment here said it has formed the “SVG Salt -Smart Coalition, a multi-sectoral group, made up of various stakeholders from public and private sectors and NGOs that will be responsible for conducting the project.
Specifically, the aim of the project is to provide strategies to encourage mothers of primary school age children to cook with less salt, by low salt products, so as to prepare their children to succeed in the 21st century free from the host of chronic diseases such as hypertension and stroke.
“In our Caribbean setting, in most cases the mother is responsible for food selection and preparation for the family, and, therefore, is in a very good position to change salt consumption habits in the home. The mother can influence the amount of salt that her children eat at home and at school.”
One of the marketing tactics in this project would be to focus interventions on changing social norms, governmental and organisational policies, and aspects of the environment – for example, access to low salt alternatives – that impact individual decisions about salt consumption, especially in the home and school.
The project was officially launched at the Kingstown Health Centre earlier this month during “World Salt Awareness Week 2016”, under the theme “Reduce Salt Healthier Life”.
Figures from the Health Information Unit (MHWE) reveal that at the end of 2013, close to 7,000 persons were diagnosed with hypertension here.
