For women’s month, a maternal halfway home was opened, marking a shift as well in the corporate social responsibility (CSR) activity of a Swiss company.

After a decade of helping an up-and-coming artist and disaster-struck countries as part of its CSR, Switzerland-based KBA-NotaSys opts to fund the building of a maternal halfway home in the Philippine town of San Felipe in Zambales.

“The project in San Felipe has been the first of its kind for KBA-NotaSys. In the past our CSR initiatives focused on countries struck by natural disasters and our annual project concerned a local, up-and-coming artist since artistry is very closely related to our core business. After having done this for about 10 years we felt it was time to review this and decided that supporting a community was a much stronger initiative than just a single individual,” shared KBA-NotaSys marketing manager Gerben Van Wijk.

KBA-NotaSys manufactures high-security banknote printers and counts the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas as one of its clients. Last March 23, company representatives witnessed the inauguration of the maternal home that was built adjacent to a birthing facility. The home will serve as a temporary shelter for expecting mothers who are due to deliver. It has two bedrooms, toilet and bathroom, plus reception and dining areas.

The home is especially important for mothers living in far-flung villages, including the indigenous Aeta people, who make up 12 percent of San Felipe’s population.

“We are very proud to offer this facility to the families of San Felipe, especially for those women who live far away and those women who do not have access to medical facilities,” said KBA-NotaSys representative Sonia Rodriguez.

Rodriguez was one of two KBA-NotaSys employees who underwent a two-week immersion in the municipality to support the finalization of the maternal halfway home and help the health workers.

San Felipe Mayor Carolyn Farinas expressed her gratitude for the donation. “I am deeply honored to accept the maternal halfway home from KBA-NotaSys in partnership with the Zuellig Family Foundation and the Department of Health (DOH). We accept not just the building but more responsibilities to do with it. We accept the challenge to continue to bring the best of health for our constituents. We accept the challenge to carry on the task to sustain our health programs to give quality care to our people.”
The Zuellig Family Foundation (ZFF) facilitated the donation of KBA-NotaSys for the halfway home in San Felipe, whose mayor and municipal health officer undertook the Municipal Leadership and Governance Program, a training program under ZFF’s partnership with the DOH.

San Felipe Mayor Atty. Carolyn Farinas (center, third from left) is flanked by representatives of KBA NotaSys Sonia Rodriguez and Natalie Neubauer during the official turnover of the maternal halfway home on March 23.

View related photos here.

“(Aim) for the high-hanging fruits in health. They taste better because of the effort and impact.”

This was the challenge of Dr. Myrna Cabotaje, Department of Health (DOH) Region 1 director, to the finishers of the “Provincial Health Leadership and Governance Program” (PLGP).

She was referring to the goal of attaining zero maternal death after the province was able to improve its service delivery network and bring a slight decline in its maternal deaths—from 23 in 2014 to 22 cases in 2015.

Health in Pangasinan, with its population making up 60 percent of Region 1, creates significant impact on the overall health status of the region; hence, improvements in the province are considered critical.

PLGP, a training program under the DOH and Zuellig Family Foundation joint initiative, is given to governors, provincial health officers, chiefs of hospitals and other relevant provincial government officials. Consisting mostly of executive sessions, PLGP helped provincial health leaders identify gaps in their provincial health and hospital systems that have led to maternal deaths.

Improvements done in the province include the implementation of pregnancy tracking so high-risk women can be identified early on and referred to hospitals that can handle their cases. Reforms are also ongoing to ensure the regular supply of blood. This is needed to address the top cause of maternal deaths in the province: hemorrhage. In 2015, hemorrhage led to 19 of the 22 maternal deaths.

Cabotaje is optimistic the province is now better equipped to address health challenges after its leaders completed the one-year PLGP. Of the 33 provinces under the program, Pangasinan was the last to enroll yet the first to complete the program requirements.

PLGP participants were coached on how to systemically approach health challenges using a roadmap anchored on the six building blocks of health (workforce, service delivery, information dissemination, leadership and governance, financing, and medicine) identified by the World Health Organization.

Focus was also given on the seven critical health indicators functional management committee, available obstetrician, reliable supply of safe blood, no stock-out of medicines, point-of- care Philippine Health Insurance Corp. enrollment, no balance billing, and maternal mortality and morbidity audits.

Speaking on behalf of the former governor now congressman-elect Amado Espino Jr., Vice Governor Jose Ferdinand Calimlim Jr. shared that “PLGP gave the provincial health team broader perspective and better understanding of their crucial and strategic roles in health governance.”

He added, “It affirms our longstanding belief that intensifying public and primary health program cannot succeed without the active and indispensable participation of different municipal and city governments. This is only possible if the provincial government will effectively exercise persuasive influence and leadership over the local chief executives and their respective health governance team and encourage the local governments to give public and primary healthcare the highest priority that it deserves.”

When you are a poor pregnant woman living in a far-flung area and about to give birth, there is a risk you do not reach the clinic on time.

In several of Zuellig Family Foundation’s (ZFF) partner municipalities, maternal shelters have been built close to birthing facilities so women and their care providers, usually family members, can have a place to temporarily stay for free for a few days before and after giving birth.

Such is the maternal home in Salcedo, Eastern Samar. The shelter was constructed with funds from the US-Philippines Society (USPS), and turned over last December.

Salcedo was also ravaged by super typhoon Haiyan (local name: Yolanda). Following the “Recovery Assistance Program for Mothers,” the municipal health leaders also underwent training so they could complete the development of a resilient local health system with assistance from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and ZFF.

“Our Foundation came to the areas of local leaders burdened by serious health challenges. We tried to strengthen their health leadership and governance. They did not fail us,” said Zuellig Family Foundation (ZFF) Trustee Daniel Zuellig in his closing remarks during the first National Health Leaders Conference (HELECON).

A primary example of good health leadership and governance that led to better health outcomes is the rural municipality of Tinambac, Camarines Sur. One of ZFF’s 72 partner local government units (LGUs) under its Community Health Partnership Program, Tinambac received the Foundation’s first Excellence Awards for Leadership in Public Health during the conference.

ZFF also recognized the following “Outstanding Bridging Leaders”: Mayor Daisy Sayangda (Santol, La Union), Mayor Melchor Petracorta (Limasawa, Southern Leyte), Mayor Alfredo Coro (Del Carmen, Surigao del Norte), Mayor Candelario Viola (Hinatuan, Surigao del Sur), Dr. Mignon Andrada (Ivisan Capiz), Mayor Belman Mantos and Dr. Hermeraldo Catubig (San Pablo, Zamboanga del Sur), Mayor Timoteo Capoquian (Gamay, Northern Samar), Dr. Perlie Langi (Motiong, Samar), Mayor Daylinda Sulong (Lapuyan, Zamboanga del Sur) and Mayor Joselito Escutin (Dao, Capiz).

Municipalities of Looc (Romblon), San Vicente (Northern Samar), Limasawa (Southern Leyte), Ivisan (Capiz), Bacolod (Lanao del Norte) and Ragay (Camarines Sur) on the other hand, were recognized for having no maternal death for five consecutive years or more.

After the awarding, Health Secretary Janet Loreto-Garin acknowledged the importance of ZFF’s strategy in addressing health inequities in the country during her closing keynote address.

“The Health Change Model of ZFF has been proven to be a catalyst in harnessing the energies, talents, and commitment of the Local Chief Executives (LCEs), Municipal Health Officers (MHOs), and community leaders in improving the health outcomes of Filipinos. For these achievements and on behalf of the Department of Health, I congratulate all of you,” said Garin.

HELECON gathered ZFF partner LGUs, and representatives of government agencies, academe and other non-government organizations to share and discuss success stories in improving health systems.

Conference speakers included LCEs, MHOs and health leaders under various programs of ZFF like Lanao del Norte Governor Khalid Dimaporo and Del Carmen Mayor Alfredo Coro. Dimaporo shared the relevance of active leadership in facilitating reforms in hospitals which ensured continuity of care for his constituents, while Coro discussed about their town’s Seal of Health Governance, a means to communicate transformative leadership at the barangay level.
National Scientist and Professor Emeritus Ernesto Domingo, together with his Universal Health Care (UHC) Study group members, presented the future status of the country’s primary health care (PHC), and the gains and issues of primary healthcare evolution from pre-primary healthcare era up to the present.

Participants of the conference also showed their support for the improvement of public healthcare by signing the “Declaration of Support for the Sustained Commitment to Health Reforms.”

The two-day event, held in SMX Convention Center, Taguig City was attended by over 200 delegates.

The Zuellig Family Foundation will host the first National Health Leaders Conference (HELECON) with a theme “Co-creating the future of Public Health.”

Participants can learn from the sessions how reforms in municipalities across the Philippines can be adopted in more areas to help address the problem of serious health inequities in the country.

The conference will gather health leaders, including Health Secretary Janette Garin, to talk about ongoing and upcoming health initiatives, leadership journeys, good practices, disaster resiliency, and health challenges.

This year’s HELECON will be held on November 24 to 25 at the SMX Convention Center, Taguig City.

Don’t miss out in joining the conversation! Follow us on Twitter (@ZFF_foundation) and like us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/zuelligfamilyfoundation/).

By Maria Teresita N. Franco

“I came here to inspire you, instead I’ll be leaving inspired,” said third district Camarines Sur Representative Leni Gerona-Robredo before mayors and municipal health officers (MHOs) of La Union and Pangasinan provinces in Region 1. The mayors and MHOs had their colloquium, a final requirement to complete their Municipal Leadership and Governance Program (MLGP), a capability program given in partnership with the Department of Health, Zuellig Family Foundation and an academic institution. During the event, mayors shared how their personal and leadership transformations paved the way for much-needed reforms in their local health systems to help their poor constituents.

Robredo, after seeing the improvements in the municipalities’ health scorecards, also shared how her husband, the late Interior Secretary Jessie Robredo, used community participation in governance to fix the political and health systems when he was the mayor of Naga City, Camarines Sur. “Mayors and MHOs should maximize the huge potential of the local government units (LGUs) because I believe the LGUs are the first line of defense of the national government especially in the face of adversities,” she added.

Another colloquium was also held in Davao City for mayors and MHOs of Region 11. In that event, San Isidro Mayor Justina Yu said, “I realized how heartbreaking it was to be poor.” Yu witnessed the struggles of her parents in availing the needed maternal health services because of poverty. Her mother, who delivered all her 12 babies with the help of a hilot (traditional birth attendant), died at 47. “I understood then that poverty is an enemy. I promised myself to help the lonely, the sick and the poor and certainly to find a way to reduce, if not eliminate, mother and childbirth mortality,” she continued.

Yu’s municipality of San Isidro reported zero maternal and infant mortality this year. She believes her participation in the MLGP helped her understand her role as a mayor and recognize the partners that could help her in identifying problems and strategies to address the needs of the poor.

Like other leaders of municipalities that had their colloquiums, Yu improved her municipal health system by strengthening the barangay and municipal health boards, improving the health information systems, opening birthing facilities and updating health technologies and equipment and hiring competent health workers.

The MLGP is a one-year, two-module training program aimed at addressing inequities in the country’s local health system by empowering local leaders including mayors and MHOs through leadership and governance training, coaching and practicum. The Academic Partner (AP) in Region 1 is Benguet State University (BSU) while the Davao Medical School Foundation, Inc. (DMSFI) is for Region 11. ZFF president Ernesto Garilao reminded leaders that though health outcomes have been improving, there are still residual challenges that need to be addressed.

“This is not the end. It is only just a beginning of becoming a champion in health. It is always important to revisit the purpose and vision of the mayors and MHOs,” said Garilao in his brief remark during the Davao Colloquium. He reiterated the importance of bridging leadership in addressing social divides and health inequities, and challenging the health leaders to continue the good practices that they have started.

Zuellig Family Foundation’s “Bridging Leadership” (BL) Framework for health has now reached Indonesia thanks to a partnership among the United Nations Population Fund’s offices in the Philippines and Indonesia, the Philippine Commission on Population (PopCom) and the Badan Kependudukan dan Keluarga Berencana Nasional (BKKBN-National Population and Family Planning Board).

Seeing BL’s value to the Indonesian health system, which is also devolved, PopCom invited ZFF to make a presentation of its strategic intervention in leadership and governance before an audience of Indonesians during their program in General Santos City in Mindanao. From that short session, ZFF found itself collaborating with PopCom for an internship program for its Indonesian partners involved in reproductive health (RH) and family planning (FP) programs.

The six-day “Internship of Indonesian Implementer on Decentralization and Family Planning and Reproductive Health Program” included a two-day training workshop and an educational trip to ZFF’s partner-municipality of Hinatuan in Surigao del Sur. In all, 14 Indonesians attended the program.

Working in the provincial offices of the BKKBN, the participants’ learning from the internship program is intended to make them the bridging leaders who will serve as the link between the national and provincial offices and the local government units or the districts, much like the responsibilities of the Filipino DOH representatives (DOH Reps), whom ZFF has been training to become effective “coaches” to mayors when it comes to improving local health systems.

Despite differences in languages, the Indonesian participants expressed appreciation for the program with one of them, Samidjo, UNFPA Indonesia programme officer, asking for more reference materials they can read so they can have more in-depth knowledge of ZFF’s teachings.

For Dr. Djoko Sulasno Nimpuno, head of the Family Welfare Office in Bantul district, the short course on BL improved his “self-esteem” and taught him “how to implement the program” he was in charge of in his country. And having heard the leadership journey narration of Santol, La Union mayor Daisy Sayangda, who underwent ZFF’s program in 2012, Sustra Dewi of Bangka Belitung district, another training participant, was also “inspired by what ZFF has done to municipalities” and hopes to be able to implement the same in her area in Indonesia.

At the closing of the internship program following their trip to Surigao del Sur province, where they also heard provincial governor Johnny Pimentel and Hinatuan mayor Candelario Viola Jr. share their leadership stories, the trainees gained greater appreciation for the importance of making RH and FP programs not only the responsibility of their leaders and district health officers but more importantly, of the community. They presented specific action plans integrating their new learning to strengthen their program implementation in Indonesia.

Country representative of UNFPA Philippines Klaus Beck, at his closing speech, also emphasized that its partnership program with the Philippines and Indonesia is aligned with the Sustainable Development Goal 17, which is on strengthening global partnerships for development.

Since 2009, ZFF has been using the BL framework to transform local health leaders—mayors, municipal health officers and relevant regional health officers like the DOH Reps in the hopes of improving the health outcomes of the Filipino poor.

Facilitating the two-day training workshop in Manila were members of ZFF’s Community Health Partnership Program team led by its director Bien Nillos, M.D., Romulo Nieva, Michael San Roque and ZFF’s partnership associate Sealdi Calo-Gonzales.

Good marketing campaign is needed to popularize and sustain health programs.

For over six years, the Zuellig Family Foundation has been giving health leadership and governance capability-building programs to mayors and municipal health officers (MHOs) of its partner municipalities. The training has led local governments to come up with innovative health programs meant to improve health outcomes.

The challenge is in communicating the programs and making them sustainable. So ZFF decided to include a session to respond to mayors’ expressed need for assistance in ensuring their health and other social programs gain traction in their communities and become sustainable beyond their terms in office.

For the session entitled “How to Communicate the Vision?” ZFF invited veteran advertising executive and FCB general manager Ellen Samano, who gave the basic pointers on how to create and execute sustainable marketing campaigns. She also pointed out that running successful campaigns does not entail big budgets for as long as local leaders can identify a small core group composed of people who believe in the program objective, can do research, has creative ideas and lead the group.

Lessons learned from Samano’s talk were also applied during the next session, which was on “Diffusing Change in the Community and Sustaining Gains.” This was facilitated by University of the Philippines-Manila Assistant Professor Anthony Cordero M.D., who also reiterated some of the points given by Samano.

The seven municipalities included in the training module belong to ZFF’s “alumni” municipalities or those whose mayors and MHOs have completed ZFF’s program.

On the opening day of the three-day colloquium of academic institutions involved in a capacity-building program for mayors and public doctors, former Health Secretary Jaime Galvez Tan underscored health as being a fundamental right of all individuals. Unfortunately, Galvez said, “It is also the most vulnerable and one of the most denied.”
Such health inequity continues to persist in the country, worsening the health outcomes of the poor as well as preventing the country from achieving its Millennium Development Goals on health.

Given the complexity of health challenges, several stakeholders have come together to overcome these. Among them are the academic institutions that were tapped to deliver health leadership and governance capability-building program to mayors and municipal health officers of different municipalities.

These academic partners are part of the Department of Health’s program with the Zuellig Family Foundation. The partnership program follows ZFF’s strategy, the “Health Change Model,” which posits that leadership is the key to jumpstarting health system reforms needed to reduce inequities and improve health indicators.

The joint initiative, called “Health Leadership and Governance Program,” began in 2013 now counts 12 academic partners that have provided training to mayors and MHOs from over 500 municipalities.

Last Wednesday, representatives of the 12 came together for the first time to deepen their appreciation for “Bridging Leadership” (BL), which is the principal framework used in turning each mayor and MHO into a leader capable of bringing people together, bridging societal divides and working towards common health goals.
Aside from Galvez Tan, participants heard the leadership journeys of individuals who were among the first to get the bridging leadership training in the Asian Institute of Management.

Brig. Gen. Carlito Galvez Jr. spoke about the difficulty of shifting military strategy from enemy-oriented to people centered in solving conflicts and insurgency. His efforts would eventually lead to the creation of the Civil Military Operations battalions unit in the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

Miriam Suacito talked about how her faith-based, Christian NGO Nagdilaam Foundation continues to thrive in the predominantly Muslim province of Basilan despite setbacks, which included having had two of her staff personnel kidnapped. Her leadership has earned the trust of the community—the military, common townsfolk and even the More rebels.

Leadership that understands and respects culture allowed Easterluna Canoy to fix the serious misunderstanding between the military and indigenous people in Mindanao.

Theirs and five others’ stories showed how strong and collaborative leadership solved complex problems and won popular support. They showed how leaders who accept ownership of a problem and work with their people could possibly fix health system failures and minimize inequities.