Newborn health in focus as Georgian PM meets Rostropovich-Vishnevskaya Foundation president

Georgia’s Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili has today met top representatives of the Rostropovich-Vishnevskaya Foundation (RVF), a Washington-based organisation that supports programs to improve the health of children worldwide.

The PM learned about the Foundation’s activities in Georgia and expressed his hope to further deepen collaboration between the country and the Foundation.

"We discussed both our ongoing programs and the projects that were planned for the future,” said the Foundation president Elena Rostropovich after the meeting, which she assessed as "very productive”.

RVF top representatives held meeting at the Prime Minister's Administration in Tbilisi. Photo by the PM's Press Office.

The focus of the meeting was the health of newborns and the importance of diagnosing existing illnesses in the first 48 hours after birth.

The programs implemented by RVF in Georgia included:

• Immunisation against measles, mumps and rubella;
• Prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV;
• Elimination of Hepatitis B;
• Prevention of mother-to-child transmission of Hepatitis B;
• Newborn screening for congenital hypothyroidism;
• Newborn screening to reveal critical forms of congenital heart disease; and
• Vaccination of medical personnel, medical students and others at risk of contracting Hepatitis B.

RVF was founded in 1991 by world-renowned cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife, soprano Galina Vishnevskaya. Currently the couple’s daughter Elena Rostropovich serves as the Foundation’s president. To date, the Foundation’s programs have reached more than 20 million children and young adults worldwide.