MALAYSIA TO HOST 8TH WORLD DESIGN AND HEALTH CONGRESS

KOTA KINABALU (Malaysia), July 16 (Bernama) -- Malaysia has been selected to
host the 8th World Design and Health Congress in June next year, said Deputy
Health Minister Rosnah Abdul Rashid Shirlin Saturday.

Rosnah, who participated at the previous congress in Boston, United States,
said the selection was based on the government's committment to improve the
health of its people and the country's facilities.

"We are happy to host the congress at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre,
between June 27 and July 1, 2012," she said.

"The Boston participants were taken up with our health sector experiences
and are looking forward to be here," she told reporters after opening the
Pathology Department's Automated Lab at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital here
Saturday.

She added, Malaysia faced similar health challenges as other countries.

"The congress emphasised on transforming the people's mindset to adopt
healthy lifestyle habits and not just pay attention to physical health aspects,"
she said.

"Actually our awareness is quite high, but the challenge is in taking
action. This is the same problem in other countries," she explained.

Commenting on the automated lab, Rosnah said: "The Pathology Department ran
about four million tests a year, half of which were biochemical tests. The
Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics technology in the new lab would reduce workload
and speed up results to enable quicker diagnosis of patients."