The WHO’s African Office is hoping to raise US $100 million from African states to create the fund.

Further consensus for setting up the fund was reached during the 60th regional committee meeting of the WHO, at which Dr Athanasius represented Seychelles.

The meeting was held in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, from August 30 to September 3, and the minister later met the regional director of the WHO’s African office, Dr Luis Gomes Sambo.

Dr Athanasius thanked him for the unfailing support the WHO has given to Seychelles. They also discussed at length Seychelles’ economic reform programme and the possible implications it might have for the health sector.

The foundation of the University of Seychelles and an eventual faculty of health sciences there were also on the agenda at this private meeting.

Dr Gomes Sambo pledged to support Seychelles in setting up this faculty if and when Seychelles makes such a request.

Before leaving Malabo, Dr Athanasius gave two important interviews with the media, firstly to speak to the official journal of the meeting about the health and social impact of alcohol.

In her interview she underscored the need to educate young people throughout Africa about the harmful effects of alcohol, through an intelligent, sustained campaign whose main outcome should be to turn them decisively away from alcohol.

She was also interviewed by a Nigerian television channel on work being done by Seychelles to achieve the fifth Millennium Development Goal to greatly reduce the maternal mortality rate by 2015.