Recent global health meetings produced plenty of commitments, but Africa's health systems are not changing as fast as the conversation, writes Githinji Gitahi, group chief executive of Amref Health Africa, in a column published by SciDev.Net's Sub-Saharan Africa desk. The views are the writer's own.
Gitahi compares two gatherings. The UN General Assembly week in New York, he says, focused on global architecture and on how money, power and responsibility are shared. The World Health Summit in Berlin brought those questions down to daily delivery: who sets priorities, whether funding strengthens services, and who is accountable when plans fail to reach people.
His central argument is that communities are already caring for one another and responding to illness, while institutions too often design a response first and then ask communities to deliver it. He cites a summit discussion in which pastoral communities became more open to family-planning conversations when engagement began with the health of their goats and livestock, and Amref's own example of a clinic that serves families and their animals together. "Begin with what matters to people," he writes.
Trust, he argues, cannot be launched with a slogan when a crisis begins; it grows through reliable services, honest explanations and participation. The same test applies to technology and data: a tool counts as progress only if it fits the work and improves decisions, and countries need a meaningful say in how health data is governed and shared. "More dashboards will not fix institutions working in separate lanes," he writes.
Health sovereignty, in Gitahi's view, does not mean going it alone. It means the capacity to set priorities, build expertise, produce essential health products and use data in ways that serve African people. Manufacturers need predictable demand and coherent regulation, researchers need sustained investment, and health workers need fair support. Climate pressures, whether an outbreak, extreme weather or chronic disease, make those links clearer, he adds.
He looks ahead to the Africa Health Agenda International Conference (AHAIC) 2027, themed "From Dialogue to Delivery", which will take place in Kigali from 28 February to 3 March. The conference cannot replace governments' responsibility to decide, finance and account for results, he writes. Its test is whether participants leave with owners, timelines and resources, and whether care then becomes more reliable.
Gitahi is a former Africa COVID-19 Response Commissioner.
Photo: Tech. Sgt. Daniel St. Pierre / Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)
Source: SciDev.Net
Comments
(0)