Beijing - Indonesian and China`s Health Ministers respectively Siti Fadila Supari and Chen Zhu signed Minutes of the Meeting prior to signing a Memorandum of Understanding about bilateral cooperation in the healthcare sector.
The signing function which was among others attended by Mohamad Oemar, deputy head of Indonesian representative in Beijing, took place at the Chinese Ministry of Health in Beijing on Monday.
"The signing constitutes an initial step of the bilateral healthcare cooperation which will be followed by the signing of an MoU," Minister Supari said, adding that a further step of the cooperation would cover political and economic health affairs.
Before signing the Minutes of the Meeting, the two health ministers who were accompanied by their delegation exchanged views on health problems in the respective country.
"Bird Flu cases apart from the bilateral cooperation become a hot issue during the exchange of views," Supari said.
"We hope the health sector cooperation between Indonesia and China can be stepped up considering that each country has the same problem of diseases like the bird flu," she said.
Meanwhile, China`s Health Minister Chen Zhu said his government hailed Indonesia`s wish to establish health cooperation including exchange of information.
Chen Zhu said further that China had encouraged Indonesia to conduct research and development of the health sector, for instance on bird flu.
On the occasion, the Chinese health minister also expressed his country`s gratitude for Indonesia`s assistance such as medical assistance to help ten thousand victims of a recent earthquake in Sichuan province.
Minister Fadila also invited Minister Chen Zhu to make a visit to Indonesia.
Source: http://www.antaranews.com (22 Juli 2008)