The fundamental purpose of Vision 2030 is to unite oral healthcare and recognize that oral health is an essential component of overall health and well-being. It makes the case for oral health to be included in Health in All Policies and any ensuing health and health-care debate.
The Vision 2020: Shaping the Future of Oral Health report published by FDI World Dental Federation in 2012, asserted the fundamental importance of oral health to overall health and well-being. Almost a decade after the publication of the landmark Vision 2020 report by FDI World Dental Federation, oral health is still not integrated into global health and development agendas or recognized as a priority by governments and individuals.
The FDI Vision 2030: Delivering Optimal Oral Health for All report (Vision 2030) confronts the strategic challenges that will face the dental profession and the oral health community over the next decade and proposes ways in which these can be turned into opportunities to improve oral health, reduce oral health inequalities and inequities, and contribute to reducing the global burden of oral diseases.
The goal of educating a responsive and resilient profession is to ensure that by 2030 healthcare professionals will have the knowledge, skills, and attributes to contribute appropriately to the effective prevention and management of oral diseases and collaborate across health disciplines to improve health and well-being.
This report addresses how the challenges facing us can be met and sets out three major goals, through the achievement of which optimal health for all can be delivered. These are that:
- Essential oral health services will be integrated into healthcare in every country and quality oral healthcare will be available, accessible, and affordable for all;
- Oral and general person-centered healthcare will be integrated, leading to more effective prevention and management of oral diseases and improved health and well-being;
- Oral health professionals will collaborate with a wide range of health workers to deliver sustainable, people-centered health-needs-based, and people-centred healthcare.
Achieving these goals and meeting the challenges outlined will not be easy and will call for oral healthcare professionals to resolve and both personal and professional resilience. However, the health gains in terms not only of improved oral health, but of improved general health and well-being are considerable.
Vision 2030 is a call to action to the profession, but it also proposes the means by which the goals set out can be achieved. IT IS NOW FOR US TO RESPOND ACCORDINGLY.
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