610.69 Ind d - Departemen Kesehatan Republik Indonesia

One More Ibu Endang Story
Robert Tilden
Back in my Michigan days, I taught a course called international
comparative health care systems. It was a course that had
been designed by Jan DeVries, but after his death I re-vamped
it a bit to include some information technology, and also
political economy, lectures. In 1991 I made the comment in an
introductory lecture, that Jakarta had a lower infant mortality
rate (it was about 24) than Detroit (32).
After return from a trip to Vietnam and Nepal, I found a very
official letter on my desk, requesting that I come before the
state legislature and explain the comment that I had made in
class (news travels faster than me sometimes) - that afternoon.
I drove to Lansing (about 150 km from A2) in jeans and flannel
shirt as I did not have time enough to go home and put on a
suit.
The first questions first concerned the validity of my claim. I
showed them the data from Indonesia. The second question
was how did they do it. I said evidence based planning.
The third question was about the public health education in
Indonesia as compared to the US. I explained that the person
responsible for the policy (Dr. Soeharto W {Kakanwil}, and
Dr. Endang) had both been trained in the US. Soeharto W at
Michigan, Endang at Harvard.
The fourth question was how to catch up with Jakarta. I told
them to try and hire Ibu Endang for Wayne County Health
Department. There was some serious discussion, but because
she was not a citizen they did not pursue it.
The fifth and final question was why were the International
Public students from Michigan out performing the American
public health students. I told them, that the international
students realized that they needed to change policy,
and domestic students were trying to fit into the existing
structure as they thought the US health care system was fine.
I thought about Soeharto and Endang on the trip back, and
laughed to myself when I pulled into the school parking
lot at UofM, thinking that when the federal funding for
our program dried up (scheduled for that year), that we
probably wouldn’t get state funding to cover the difference,
and immediately started looking for a state side job.
So she really did a lot all of her career. A first class public health
development officer, a world class researcher, and a beloved
leader of the Ministry of Health. Thank you ibu Endang.
Unfortunately the infant mortality rate of Detroit is still above 25. (a
urban DBK in the rust belt of the US). ndut
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