The main goal of the Ministry of Health is to provide and continually improve the health services of the Rwandan population through the provision of preventive, curative and rehabilitative health care thereby contributing to the reduction of poverty and enhancing the general well-being of the population.

Objectives

In a bid to achieve its mission, the Ministry of Health has put forward seven major objectives that are to be achieved by the year 2015:

• Human Resources Development
• Availability of drugs, vaccines & consumables
• Geographical accessibility of health services
• Financial accessibility of health services
• Quality of and demand for health services in the control of diseases
• Strengthening national referral hospitals, treatment & research centres
• Institutional capacity building

The Ministry of Health’s key strategies are based upon the recently revised National Health Sector Policy which focuses on:

• The decentralization of the health system using the health district as the basic operational unity of the system
• The development of the primary health care system through its eight core components
• The reinforcement of evidence based medicine: Integrated management of childhood illnesses, clinical care of obstetrical emergencies to decrease infant and maternal mortality rates
• The reinforcement of community participation in the management and financing services