The second cohort of grade-seven girls are now benefiting from the Ministry of Health’s Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccination programme. The move is a proactive measure by the Government to protect girls against cervical cancer, which takes the lives of hundreds of women in the country per year and hundreds of thousands more worldwide. The vaccine is being administered to...

Minister of Health, Dr. the Hon. Christopher Tufton, says world leaders who participated in the third United Nations (UN) High-level Meeting on Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) have committed to taking steps to tackle the issue. “The NCD crisis is real and a danger to all of us. The statistics suggest that close to four billion of the seven-billion population of the...

The Jamaica Cultural Development Commission (JCDC) is staging a series of activities across the island from October 8 to 15 in celebration of National Heritage Week, under the theme ‘One Love…One Family…One Heritage’. Director for Community and Cultural Development Services at the JCDC, Marjorie Leyden-Vernon, told JIS News that the activities include parish awards ceremonies, church services, heritage festivals and...

The Government will be undertaking an educational campaign surrounding the impending ban on the importation, manufacture, distribution and use of specific categories of plastic packaging materials. Government Senator Matthew Samuda, who made the disclosure during Friday’s (October 5) sitting of the Senate, said the campaign will, among other things, highlight alternative packaging materials. “There is nothing that the Government has...

Custos of St. James, Bishop the Hon. Conrad Pitkin, has charged the parish’s justices of the peace (JPs) to be ethical in the performance of their duties and avoid actions that bring the office into disrepute. He urged the JPs not to recommend anyone by filling out forms or vouch for persons not known to them. “I, therefore, ask you...

Jamaica Manufacturers and Exporters’ Association (JMEA) President, Metry Seaga, has charged manufacturers and exporters to “produce local and export global”. He was speaking at the JMEA awards gala held on Saturday (October 6) at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston. Mr. Seaga said that manufacturing is showing positive signs with good growth numbers each quarter. “I personally am very...

Vector Control Officer at the Westmoreland Health Department, Ryan Morris, says the Aedes Aegypti mosquito population in the parish should decrease with the help of the second cohort of 25 Housing, Opportunity, Production and Employment (HOPE) programme vector control workers. Mr. Morris informed JIS News that the mosquito population had increased with the recent heavy rains, and the HOPE programme...