Wayne Hunte
Wayne Hunte is the new Health Promotions Officer (HPO); announced by Elijah Silcott, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health on Monday, March 2, 2012. Hunte studied marketing at the University of Guyana with additional credits in psychology.
According to the Ministry, the new HPO is a trained Tobacco Dependence Treatment Specialist and completed specialised training at the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communication (CARIMAC), University of the West Indies (UWI) Jamaica, in Health Communication for Behaviour Change and Advocacy Communication, along with Addiction Studies from the Caribbean Institute on Alcoholism and Other Drugs, UWI Trinidad. Hunte’s first involvement in health started in 1998 in Guyana where he responded to the AIDS Epidemic in Guyana.
He comes from a background where he has managed several health projects in the pass which includes a Cervical Cancer Research Project funded by the Gender Equity Fund of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and has recently completed the International Course on Cervical Cancer Prevention through the Catalan Institute of Oncology in Spain.
The new HPO comes with much experience as a freelance health journalist who delights in writing on men’s health and researching herbal medicine. He is reassuring the Montserrat community that as health promotion officer he will continue the ministry’s focus on prevention. “Trends continue to show that in developing nations like Montserrat most people are dying from the non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, cancers and respiratory illness like asthma. We are going to continue encouraging people to take an active role in their health and make lifestyle changes to reduce risk of illness. We want to see people reducing the use of alcohol, tobacco and using salt, while promoting much more physical activity.”
Hunte’s post became effective April 1, 2012 and was a merger of two previous roles of STI/HIV/AIDS Coordinator and Health Promotions Officer. He will work out of the STI/HIV Office in St. Peters and can be reached at 491-4533.
