The WHO’s action plan for oral health

Abstract

The oral health action plan, recommended for adoption to the Sixtieth World Health Assembly of the World Health Organization in January 2007, included many of the necessary components. Had fissure sealants been added to the list of prevention methods and the roles of dental educational institutions and hygiene community better clarified, the action plan would have made a more viable and realistic package for the ministries and their directors of national programmes receiving the support of the World Health Organization and partners. Sealants remain under-utilized, few dental hygienists are integrated in the primary oral health team and fewer dental graduates have had service-learning experiences--all contradictory to the evidence in the literature. Translating research findings into public health action programmes is one of the recommendations made in the action plan and one way we can begin this is by implementing sealant programmes in 'Health Promoting Schools' that are WHO's brain child and borne of the wisdom of using schools as 'platforms' for the promotion and delivery of health care to the community.