The government of Maldives considers that the
enjoyment of the highest attainable level of health is a
basic right of every citizen. Thus it lays emphasis on the
accessibility and affordability of health care services. In
order to achieve these objectives, it is very important to
expand curative services as well as preventive services in
the country. The major hurdles faced by the country are
result of the inherent structural problem faced by the
county which leads to sever diseconomies of scale in the
provision of healthcare services. Community and individual
involvement and self-reliance are very important to
achieve Health for All by the Year 200 AD. Community
participation is one of the domains of community capacity
building in a small island country. It is one of the mechanisms
to empower people to take part in community
development. In this paper, the nature, the dimensions of
community participation, and its role and scope in implementation
of different components of primary health care
have been described. The health services in public and
curative care have been briefed. Some of the achievements
in health sector have also been briefly presented.