A four-day long training programme titled ‘Urban Health in Bangladesh’ was inaugurated on Sunday (November 7, 2021) at Nabab Nawab Ali Chowdhury Senate Bhaban of Dhaka University (DU).
DU Population Sciences Department and UNFPA jointly organized this training program. State Minister for Planning Prof. Dr. Shamsul Alam was present as the chief guest at the inaugural function.
Presided over by the Chairman of the Department of Population Sciences of DU Prof. Dr. Md Rabiul Haque the inaugural function was addressed by DU Pro-Vice Chancellor (Academic) Prof. Dr. A.S.M. Maksud Kamal and Chief of Health, UNFPA Bangladesh Dr. Vibhavendra Singh Raghuvanshi as the special guests. Prof. Dr. Mohammad Mainul Islam, Convener of the Urban Health Training Implementation Committee of Department of Population Sciences presented an overview of the training programme.
State Minister Prof. Dr. Shamsul Alam said, now a days management of urban health system faces many challenges due to rapid growth of population and urbanization. Under the dynamic leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Bangladesh Government has taken several initiatives to cope with the challenges of health security. This training program would help ensure the health security and fundamental rights of general people of the country, he hoped.
Population growth in urban areas is 2.5% whereas the national population growth rate is less than 1.4%. The biggest city, Dhaka alone accounts for 40% of the urban population. The other five divisional cities account for 29% while 309 municipality towns have 31% urban population.
He hoped that this training program would contribute to both the urban health enactment and the implementation levels. He thanked the Department of Population Sciences and UNFPA for arranging this training program.