Chronic Disease, Focus on Primary Care
PAHO and Colombia Meet in Bogotá

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On May 27, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and Colombia's Ministry of Health and Social Protection held a workshop in Bogotá under the "Better Care for NCDs" initiative. Noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) such as heart disease, diabetes, cancer and chronic respiratory illness have long been the leading cause of death across the Americas. Yet few countries have managed to fold their management properly into their health systems, and that gap framed the meeting.

NCDs Are Eating Away at Latin America

Across the Americas, 2.2 million people die from an NCD each year between the ages of 30 and 69, their prime working years, deaths classed as premature. According to PAHO, total NCD deaths rose 31% over the past two decades, with the increase especially marked among those aged 40 to 64.

The drivers, alongside an aging population, are the spread of ultra-processed foods, declining physical activity and rising obesity. The geography is uneven too: lower- and middle-income countries with weaker primary care tend to have higher mortality.

What the Bogotá Meeting Discussed

The workshop centered on technical cooperation toward Colombia's ten-year NCD management plan. Anselm Hennis, who heads PAHO's department of noncommunicable diseases and mental health, stressed three pillars: prevention, reducing risk factors and strengthening primary care.

One topic was food labeling. Participants discussed how to roll out a Colombian version of the front-of-package "warning labels" that Chile pioneered to flag unhealthy ingredients. The shared direction was clear: rather than concentrating care in specialist hospitals, build a system that detects and manages NCDs early at the level of local clinics, improving both cost-effectiveness and patients' quality of life.

Primary Care and Continuity of Care

Why primary care matters so much for NCDs comes down to the nature of the diseases. Hypertension, diabetes and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) require long-term management once diagnosed. Repeatedly traveling to a specialist hospital for that is unsustainable, both for patients and for health budgets.

If local clinics can instead handle medication management, lifestyle guidance and early screening, they can cut unnecessary visits to acute-care hospitals while preventing conditions from worsening. Colombia faces a structural problem in the strained finances of its EPS (social-insurance health funds), so shoring up primary care is directly tied to the sustainability of the whole system.

The 2025-2030 Regional Action Plan

The Bogotá workshop is part of a larger framework. In October 2025, PAHO's 62nd Directing Council approved an Americas-wide action plan for the prevention and control of NCDs covering 2025 to 2030. It rests on three pillars: reducing risk factors, integrating NCD management into primary care, and strengthening surveillance.

Countries are expected to build their own national implementation plans on top of this regional plan. Colombia's ten-year plan is one of the first concrete examples.

The Author's View

"Move chronic disease into primary care" can sound like a debate about administrative efficiency. But seen from the side of people living with disability or chronic illness, it is a question about quality of life itself. Whether early intervention and continuous care actually reach them is continuous with the everyday footing of life: keeping a job, taking part in society, and using assistive and supportive devices appropriately over time.

I research assistive-device subsidy systems and social security, and I have spent years close to the realities on the ground in Latin America, starting with Costa Rica. What I felt again and again there is that a fine plan means little if the goods, the people and the knowledge do not actually reach the local clinic. Whether health care can shift from a place that cures illness to a system that supports living, that is the test, and NCD policy is where you can measure whether that shift is real. Strengthening primary care is unglamorous, but I see it as the single most effective move.

Glossary

NCDs (Enfermedades No Transmisibles, noncommunicable diseases) is the umbrella term for chronic conditions tied to lifestyle and aging rather than infection. Atención Primaria (primary care) is the basic, frontline care delivered by local clinics. EPS (Entidades Promotoras de Salud) are the funds that run Colombia's social health insurance, central to the system yet long troubled by financial strain.

Can health care shift from a place that cures illness to a system that supports living? NCD policy is the test.

※ This article is the author’s commentary based on public information. Please confirm the latest figures, dates and procedures with governments and primary sources. Quotations are kept minimal and sources are cited.