From 14-18 June 2026, the International Confederation of Midwives (ICM) will host the 34^th International Confederation of Midwives Triennial Congress in Lisbon, Portugal under the theme: One Million More Midwives.

Through high-level plenary sessions, workshops, symposia, presentations, and satellite meetings, the convening will bring together midwives, midwives’ associations, educators, researchers, and partners from around the world. This gathering serves as an opportunity to share knowledge ,shape the future of midwifery and sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn, and adolescent health (SRMNAH).

The Congress draws inspiration from Portugal’s iconic azulejos; decorative tiles that reflect the nation’s history, culture, and identity. This rich artistic tradition has influenced the branding of the 34^th ICM Triennial Congress, symbolising storytelling, values, and collective progress.

Why This Matters

Each year, an estimated 178 000 mothers and 1 million newborns die in the Africa region. Most of these deaths are preventable with access to skilled midwifery care. Yet despite progress in recent years, many countries across the continent still face severe shortages of skilled health workers, particularly midwives, limiting access to essential sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn, and adolescent health services.

‘One Million More Midwives’ speaks directly to Africa’s health priorities. The Congress brings African midwives, policymakers, researchers, and health advocates together to share experiences, draw on global best practices, and build the collaborations needed to tackle the continent’s maternal and newborn health challenges.

Register to attend the 34^th International Confederation of Midwives Triennial Congress 2026

From 26-31 July 2026, International AIDS Society (IAS) will be hosting the 26th International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2026) which will take place in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil with the theme: Rethink. Rebuild. Rise.

Through high-level plenary sessions, symposia, oral presentations, and satellite meetings, the convening will bring together people living with HIV, researchers, policymakers, healthcare professionals, funders, media representatives, and communities from across the globe, both in person and virtually. The gathering will serve as a platform to rethink outdated models, rebuild systems to put people first, and rise together through inclusive policies, innovation and sustained collaboration.

Brazil has long been recognised for its science-driven, human rights-based approach to HIV response. In the late 1990s, it became the first middle-income country to provide free access to highly active anti-retroviral therapy to people living with HIV, setting up a global benchmark for equitable treatment access.

With AIDS 2026 taking place just four years before the 2030 deadline for global HIV targets, the conference comes at a critical moment for global HIV response.

Why This Matters

Hosting AIDS 2026 conference comes at a pivotal moment for the global HIV responses as shifting geopolitical dynamics and funding uncertainties threaten decades of progress. With the 2030 deadline now just four years away, the conference is a vital moment to assess how far the global response has come, confront the inequalities and other barriers still standing in the way, and strengthen the evidence-based policies and programmes needed to reach the goal in time.

For Africa, home to an estimated 65% of all people living with HIV, the stakes could not be higher. As external funding contracts and global attention drifts, the continent stands to lose the most from any retreat in the HIV response — making AIDS 2026 a decisive moment to defend hard-won gains, close the persistent gaps in prevention, treatment, and care, and push for financing models that put African countries in the lead. How loudly Africa speaks here will help determine whose priorities shape the path to 2030.

Africa Health Watch Dispatch: Live from Rio De Janeiro

Africa Health Watch will be providing timely reporting and analysis through our Africa Health Dispatch series. Readers can expect:

· Live updates from major plenary sessions and high-level engagements

· Concise summaries of priority discussions and key takeaways

· Voices and perspectives from policymakers, public health experts, and emerging leaders

· Contextual analysis connecting conversations to African realities

Register to attend AIDS 2026, the 26th International AIDS Conference

From June 9–12, 2026, global leaders, researchers, policymakers, and practitioners will convene in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, for the fourth Global Health Security Conference (GHS2026), a major gathering focused on advancing collective action to address emerging health threats and strengthen global resilience.

The conference will be hosted with the support of the United Nations University International Institute for Global Health (UNU-IIGH) and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) as the official Local Organising Partners.

The Global Health Security Conference provides a platform to exchange knowledge, strengthen partnerships, and shape strategies for improving health security. Guided by the mission to bring together leaders, researchers, policymakers, and representatives from government, international organisations, civil society, and private industry, the convening aims to foster a multidisciplinary community of practice committed to improving global health security and eliminating disease, regardless of origin or source.

The convening will feature a robust programme including 10 keynote sessions, 123 panel discussions, 26 workshops, and 10 sponsored breakfasts and lunches. More than 40 speakers are expected, alongside over 1,059 delegates from 65 countries, and discussions will focus on progress made in strengthening health systems, as well as identifying gaps and opportunities to improve global responses to future health crises.

Why This Matters

Recent global health emergencies have shown the importance of coordinated, evidence-driven, and cross-sectoral responses to health threats. GHS2026 comes at a critical moment for strengthening global preparedness and improving the ability of countries to respond to outbreaks and other public health emergencies.

The conference highlights the growing recognition that health security requires collaboration beyond traditional health sectors. It brings together expertise from multiple disciplines to strengthen prevention, detection, and response systems for future health threats.

For African countries, where health systems continue to face both infectious disease pressures and structural challenges, the discussions at GHS2026 offer an opportunity to engage with global approaches to health security and explore lessons relevant to strengthening regional preparedness and resilience.

Learn more about the Global Health Security Conference 2026 and explore the full programme here

Organised by Jhpiego, the session titled “Frontline First: Investing in and Designing AI for Real-World Care” brought together policymakers, funders, innovators and implementers to discuss how artificial intelligence (AI) could support frontline health workers, particularly in low-resource settings where workforce shortages and weak infrastructure continue to strain healthcare delivery.

But beneath the optimism around innovation was a more cautious conversation about governance, fragmented data systems and the growing number of externally designed digital health tools entering African health systems without clear coordination and oversight.

“We should be investing in frontline workers and community health systems; all of what we do as innovators and investors should be to help the frontline make better decisions as they render services,” said Lilly Steele of the Global Innovation Fund.

The focus on frontline care shaped much of the session. Speakers repeatedly stressed that AI tools cannot be designed in isolation from the communities and health systems they are meant to serve. Trust, localisation and integration also emerged as recurring themes, especially as participants reflected on the uneven track record of digital health interventions across the continent.

Several speakers warned that African countries are already dealing with fragmented health information systems that duplicate reporting processes and place additional burdens on healthcare workers. Without stronger governance frameworks and interoperability standards, participants argued, AI risks becoming another disconnected layer in already overstretched systems.

There was also discomfort with the continued dominance of donor-driven, externally developed technologies. Participants questioned whether tools designed outside local realities can respond meaningfully to the day-to-day pressures facing frontline workers and community health systems.

The discussion became more grounded as representatives from Zambia and Mozambique shared experiences from their own countries, offering examples of how AI-supported approaches are being explored within health systems. While the conversations did not present AI as a cure-all, they pointed to growing interest in practical applications that can support decision-making, improve service delivery and strengthen community-level care.

What stood out throughout the session was the insistence that technology alone is not the story. In many African settings, community health workers remain the backbone of primary healthcare delivery, and speakers argued that any meaningful AI investment must strengthen, not sideline, those systems.

At a moment when global health conversations are increasingly filled with excitement about AI, the side event offered a more grounded reminder: innovation means little if it cannot work within the realities of the health systems expected to carry it.

African Heads of State and global health leaders who gathered in Accra in August 2025 to reimagine a new global health architecture are now attempting to move the conversation declarations and political rhetoric. From the United Nations General Assembly in New York, to Davos, and now Geneva, the Accra Reset has evolved from a call for health sovereignty into a broader effort to reshape how global health systems are financed and governed. That shift was evident at the “Geneva Clarion Call”, convened by Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama on the sidelines of the 79^th World Health Assembly, where he outlined a three-pillar plan aimed at translating the ambitions of Accra Reset into practical action.

At the centre of the Geneva Clarion Call was a three-pillar framework designed to move the Accra Reset from political ambition to implementation. The pillars will seek to strengthen accountability, improve coordination among global health institutions, and mobilise financing aligned with country health priorities.

(i) A High-Level Panel made up of 18 experts from six continents, established to examine how global health reforms are being implemented. According to Mahama, the panel will report directly to heads of state, rather than the institutions under review, which have already started work.

(ii) The Reform Interlocking Observatory (RIO) a mechanism designed to track reforms across major global health institutions, including The Global Fund, Gavi, and the World Health Organization (WHO), with the aim of improving coordination and ensuring reforms align with country-level priorities.

(iii) The Health Investment National Gateway Enablers (HINGE), a platform focused on turning health priorities into investment-ready projects, particularly in maternal health and bio-innovation. The initiative aims to deliver bankable co-financed deals within 24 months, with the International Finance Corporation, Agence Française de Développement (AFD), and AfreximBank invited to support the first structured deal ahead of the 2026 UN General Assembly.

Yet, beneath the growing momentum, lies the difficult reality of how sovereignty will be implemented within existing systems. Dr Vanessa Kerry, CEO of Seed Global Health, presented preliminary findings from mapping the global health reform landscape. “Despite language around sovereignty and country ownership, the truth is those who control funding still shape priorities based on their own political pressures and interests”

Bringing global health institutions into focus, Executive Director of the Global Fund, Peter Sands described the Accra Reset as “raising the bar” for both countries and global health institutions. He pointed to Nigeria’s ongoing efforts to channel HIV and tuberculosis financing through the national health insurance scheme as an example of how vertical programmes are beginning to integrate into nationally led systems. Sands also announced a new Memorandum of Understanding between the Global Fund and Africa CDC focused on collaborative procurement models, combining regional purchasing with global-scale access where necessary.

Gavi’s CEO, Dr. Sania Nishtar explained Gavi’s ongoing reforms as an operational expression of the Accra Reset. “The Gavi Leap is basically Accra Reset in implementation,” she said, describing efforts to simplify processes, digitise systems, and place greater decision-making power in the hands of countries over vaccine priorities, financing, and technical partnerships.

Priya Basu of the Pandemic Fund also explained the fund’s allocation of over $600 million across 27 African countries, with countries committing about $1.8 billion of their own resources. Basu explained the model is structured to crowd in financing from governments, multilateral banks, and global health partners, while ensuring countries retain control over how funds are used through nationally led budgeting and implementation processes.

Even as the Accra Reset pushed for stronger country ownership, President Mahama emphasised that sovereignty should not be mistaken for isolation:

“Some people feel that they can go on their own, but what you forget is that we are passengers in the same bus, and that bus is this globe. No country can live in isolation. There are some things we cannot deal with alone. We need to come together as a world to do that, and the only way we can do it is through the multilateral institutions that we have”

~ H.E John Dramani Mahama

Domestic Commitments

Across the room, ministers and health officials pointed to concrete domestic commitments. Ghana had uncapped an additional $300 million for healthcare investment. Kenya’s Health Minister, Aden Duale, said his country had mobilised the equivalent of $1.4 billion in domestic healthcare financing within 18 months, with 31.8 million Kenyans already registered under its social health insurance fund.

In Nigeria, Kelechi Ohiri, DG of the National Health Insurance Authority, highlighted the country’s Health Sector Blueprint and sector-wide approach, which has aligned federal and state governments, alongside development partners, under a single national framework. He also noted that the Nigerian Senate recently approved an increase in primary healthcare allocation from 1% to 2% of consolidated national revenue.

Why This Matters

The Accra Reset conversations are gaining political momentum at a time when the foundations of global health cooperation are shifting rapidly, and in ways that could either strengthen or undermine Africa’s sovereignty ambitions. As multilateral financing weakens, major powers like the United States are pursuing bilateral health agreements with individual African countries, often tied to financing, digital systems, supply chains, and data governance.

While these partnerships may offer immediate value for countries under pressure, they also risk fragmenting Africa’s collective negotiating power if pursued outside stronger continental coordination mechanisms. This points to why the role of the African Union and Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention now matters more than ever.

As the Accra Reset begins constructing a more formal governance architecture through its newly announced High-Level Panel and Consultative Group, a key test of success may be whether sovereignty can be institutionalised collectively as a region before external interests reorganise the system around fragmented national deals.

From 27-28 May 2026, leaders, policymakers, IT executives, medical practitioners, investors, and health tech startups across Africa will convene in Johannesburg, South Africa, for the Healthcare Innovation Summit (HISA) 2026 - a high-level gathering focused on shaping the future of healthcare delivery across the continent. The summit is hosted by IT News Africa under the theme : “Connected Care, Smarter Systems: Building a Digitally Resilient African Health Ecosystem”.

Discussions will span digital health transformation, artificial intelligence, telemedicine, smart healthcare systems, health financing, data-driven care, and scalable technologies that strengthen access and outcomes.

Through keynote sessions, panel discussions, innovation showcases, and networking engagements, the summit will examine how partnerships, investment, and technology can build more resilient healthcare systems across Africa.

Why This Matters

Africa’s healthcare system is facing continued workforce shortages, disease outbreaks and unequal access to care. At the same time, the continent is experiencing rapid growth in digital health, AI, telemedicine and supply chain innovations. As Africa emerges as a growing hub for health innovation, there is an urgent need for scalable, locally driven solutions capable of transforming healthcare delivery and strengthening system resilience across the continent.

Hosting HISA in Africa comes at a pivotal moment for the continent’s health sector. With growing momentum around innovation, technology, and locally driven reforms, the summit offers an important platform to continue elevating African-led solutions, strengthen cross-sector partnerships, and advance more resilient, inclusive, and future-ready health systems.

Register Here To Attend Healthcare Innovation Summit Africa 2026

Sierra Leone has achieved over 70% reduction in maternal mortality over the last two decades. This is good progress for a health system once overwhelmed by conflict and chronic workforce shortages. This progress has been driven by a combination of interventions: stronger systems for tracking high-risk pregnancies, expanded midwifery capacity, improved quality of care, and a nationwide “300 Days Campaign” built around a simple but ambitious commitment to zero preventable maternal deaths, zero preventable child deaths, and zero, zero-dose children.

Across the session, speakers repeatedly returned to one point: preventing maternal and newborn deaths is not only about technology or funding. It is about whether the chain of care holds from community to clinic to referral centres and whether every actor in that chain understands the urgency of their role.

Malawi and Nigeria also shared lessons from implementing the Safer Births Bundle of Care. This approach combines simulation-based training, mentorship corners for nurses and midwives, newborn resuscitation skills, and emergency stabilisation procedures. The model is designed to help frontline health workers detect early warning signs and respond quickly before complications become fatal.

Civil society organisations and funders involved in scaling the programme argued that technical interventions alone are not enough. Advocacy, political visibility and community ownership are equally critical.

This point came through remarks by Doris Mollel of the Doris Mollel Foundation, who reflected on her advocacy for preterm babies and maternal health.

“When you speak, who are you speaking to and what are you saying?” she asked. “Health needs the loud and famous voices to gain the attention of politicians and policymakers.”

Her comments mirrored the prevailing concerns over funding cuts affecting life-saving interventions across Africa. African countries are trying to sustain progress in maternal and child health amid shrinking overseas development assistance, workforce shortages, and competing political priorities.

Yet Sierra Leone’s campaign suggests that momentum is still possible even within constrained systems.

What makes the 300-day initiative compelling is its reliance on disciplined coordination, visible leadership, and a shared national commitment to accountability, instead of dependence on a new policy architecture. The campaign turns survival into something measurable, public, and urgent.

For most African countries, especially Nigeria, where maternal mortality remains stubbornly high, the question is not whether solutions exist. Many already do. The harder question is whether the same level of unified action can be mobilised and sustained in a simple yet powerful resolution to say Zero preventable maternal, child deaths in the next one year.

Cape Town, South Africa will host the 18th World Congress on Public Health (WCPH) from September 6–9, 2026, convening more than 2,000 public health professionals, policymakers, and advocates from around the world. The Congress is organised by the World Federation of Public Health Associations (WFPHA) in partnership with the Public Health Association of South Africa (PHASA).

It is the first time the World Congress on Public Health has been held in Southern Africa, and its first return to African soil in nearly three decades, a reflection of Africa’s growing voice in global health.

With its breathtaking landscapes and rich cultural heritage, Cape Town provides a fitting setting to confront today’s most pressing global health challenges under the Congress theme: “Health Without Borders: Equity, Inclusion, and Sustainability.”

The programme features plenaries, World Leadership Dialogues (WLD), symposia, workshops, poster sessions, and oral presentations - formats designed to foster substantive, cross-disciplinary discussions.

Why This Matters

Africa faces an unprecedented surge in health emergencies even as foreign aid declines sharply. The Congress arrives at a pivotal moment, placing the continent at the centre of global public health conversations and decision-making.

For Africa, hosting the Congress will strengthen partnerships, attract investment in health research and infrastructure, and amplify African perspectives in global health governance, reinforcing the continent’s readiness to move from crisis response to solution leadership.

Register to attend the 18th World Congress on Public Health — Cape Town, September 6–9, 2026

“Africa is not a real market”

This statement made during a keynote plenary at the World Health Summit Regional Meeting (WSRM2026), titled “Manufacturing Health in Africa: Sovereignty, Scale and Supply Chains” reflected the recognition that manufacturing alone will not secure Africa’s health sovereignty. There is need for coordinated market systems to sustain it.

The COVID-19 pandemic fundamentally reshaped conversations around health manufacturing and supply chains across Africa. As countries struggled with delayed access to vaccines, diagnostics, medicines, and other important medical supplies, the pandemic exposed the risks of relying heavily on external markets during global emergencies, and brought a recognition that health manufacturing is a matter of sovereignty and resilience, beyond it being an industrial ambition of countries on the continent.

Speaking during the panel, Dr Omar Albush, representing the Principal Secretary for Public Health, Kenya, described manufacturing as a “strategic imperative” tied to both health security and national resilience. “Health security is not charity. It is sovereignty,” he said, emphasising that no country can say it has achieved health security, if it cannot reliably produce and procure health products, in addition to strengthening last mile delivery its population depends on. He noted that Kenya strives to position itself as a leader in this transformation, guided by a presidential directive to achieve 50% local manufacturing of essential health products and technologies by the end of 2026. However, as countries accelerate manufacturing ambitions, panelists repeatedly cautioned that factories alone cannot sustain a manufacturing ecosystem.

For decades, Africa has operated as a supplied market, one where external institutions such as Gavi and UNICEF aggregate demand, negotiate prices with manufacturers, and coordinate distribution on behalf of countries. While these donor-backed procurement mechanisms have expanded vaccine access across the continent, they have enabled a market structure heavily dependent on external purchasing decisions rather than coordinated continental ownership.

Vandana Shah, Vice President, Health Systems Strengthening at the Global Health Advocacy Incubator, identified a conflict at the heart of the agenda. As countries transition from Gavi support, they tend to lose the pooled procurement advantages that previously guaranteed pricing stability, demand consistency and must now buy on their own terms. Meanwhile, procurement systems across the continent are often designed to prioritise the cheapest available product, putting African manufacturers who have not yet achieved the volumes needed to compete on price at a disadvantage. As Shah said, “the market has been shaped by multilateral financing, which brought consistency, but not country-level ownership.”

However, as Shah identified the procurement logic problem, others on the panel challenged a fundamental assumption. Dr. Tala Jallow, Director, African Pooled Procurement Mechanism (APPM), pushed the discussion further by challenging the idea that Africa lacks a viable health products market:

“We have the market...but we have been focused on fragmentation that we don’t have a sense of direction sometimes. One of the things that we are doing with the African pool procurement mechanism is, first, a market shaping tool. We need to leverage our continental purchasing power to be able to shape our market”

~ Dr. Tala Jallow

This reframed one of the central assumptions surrounding Africa’s manufacturing ambitions. Although African countries collectively spend billions annually on medicines, vaccines, and other health products, procurement systems remain fragmented across national borders, with differing regulations, purchasing laws, and market priorities limiting manufacturers’ ability to scale sustainably.

Through the African Pooled Procurement Mechanism (APPM), Africa CDC hopes to aggregate continental purchasing power, support African manufacturers, and create more predictable demand for locally produced health commodities.

Dr. Tala also stressed that efforts to harmonise regulatory pathways through institutions such as the African Medicines Regulatory Harmonization and the African Medicines Agency are intended to ensure that regulation becomes “an enabler for market access” rather than a barrier.

She pointed to the evolution of antiretroviral (ARV) medicines as an example; “when ARVs started, they cost around $175 per patient yearly. Now it’s less than $30 because we kept the market going, scaling up, increasing the volumes....but if we start the conversation by talking about how the prices of African manufacturers is going to be very high, we are killing the market before it even succeeds.”

Why This Matters

When African countries cannot reliably produce and purchase their own health products, the consequences are measured in lives lost, due to outbreaks that spiral because of delays in accessing medical countermeasures. The conversations at the World Health Summit Regional Meeting in Nairobi made clear that the path forward must go beyond building factories. It will require building the market conditions that make those factories viable, sustainable, oriented toward African health needs, with distribution channels that ensure products reach their markets.

Proof of concept already exists in some African countries. Egypt now sources 80% of its health products domestically. Ethiopia has shifted to over 40% local manufacturing. Rwanda is constructing an end-to-end pharmaceutical ecosystem from the ground up, anchored by continental partnerships and long-term vision. These examples show that deliberate policy, sustained political will and coordinated investment can move the needle.

The African region is a large, yet fragmented market, with manufacturers ready to scale. What is now required, is for procurement and distribution to become strategic tools, leveraging on existing mechanism such as the African Continental Free Trade Area (AFCTA) and others. Until that shift happens, manufacturing in Africa will remain an aspiration that remains unfulfilled.

Convened annually by the World Health Organization, the World Health Assembly, will bring together ministers of health, diplomats, researchers, multilateral agencies, civil society organisations, and global health leaders in Geneva, Switzerland, for its seventy-ninth session (WHA79).

Holding from May 18–23, 2026, delegations from all WHO Member States gather during the Assembly to shape policies and priorities that influence health systems across the globe.

What to Expect at the Seventy-ninth World Health Assembly

This year’s Assembly convenes against a backdrop of shifting donor commitments and mounting pressure on health systems, with high-level debates, technical sessions, and strategic roundtables tackling the world’s most urgent public health challenges.

Proceedings from the Assembly will be webcast live in six official languages — Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish — expanding access to audiences around the world.

Why This Matters

The Assembly is where global health policy is made. Resolutions adopted here set the direction for WHO’s work, shape donor financing, and bind Member States to commitments on pandemic preparedness, disease elimination, and access to medicines.

For African countries, the stakes are higher this year. With traditional donor flows contracting and the continent pushing for local vaccine manufacturing, stronger primary healthcare, and a louder voice in global health governance, WHA79 is a chance to convert long-standing positions into binding outcomes.

What gets negotiated in Geneva over six days will shape health budgets, supply chains, and policy choices across African capitals for years to come.

Africa Health Dispatch: Live from Geneva

Africa Health Watch will be on the ground in Geneva, bringing timely insights and on-the-ground reporting through our Africa Health Dispatch series.

Through these updates, we will follow key conversations as they unfold, unpacking what global decisions and debates mean for African health systems, institutions, and communities.

For more information, visit the World Health Assembly official page for proceedings and explore related events through the WHA79 side events page.

Nigeria has achieved some of the most ambitious malaria control campaigns globally. In 2023, nearly 29 million children were reached through Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention – the highest number anywhere in the world, protecting children during the peak transmission season. Yet despite this achievement, the country still carries the heaviest malaria burden globally, accounting for roughly 27 percent of all cases.

This exposes a clear paradox. Nigeria can mobilise at an extraordinary scale when a campaign demands it. What it has not yet cracked is the same reliability, accountability, and coordination when it comes to routine care. Across nearly 1,900 health facilities surveyed in northern states, more than half reported stockouts of the malaria treatments needed by patients, not because the medicines were unavailable in the country, but because distribution failed to get them to the point of care.

Delivery failures are not neutral. They fall hardest on the most under-resourced and hardest-to-reach communities – the people most likely to be turned away from care because treatments are out of stock. As such, strengthening delivery systems is not only an efficiency issue, but an equity imperative that needs to be addressed with utmost urgency.

Nigeria already has much of what it takes to combat malaria. The challenge now is translating the efficiency of campaign logistics into everyday system discipline. Achieving this is arguably the quickest and highest-return investment the country can make in malaria today, especially as external health financing contracts and Nigeria, like other high-burden countries, faces growing pressure to do more with what it already has. That makes this the moment to use remaining support to strengthen delivery systems while it still exists. Once that support declines further, the cost of fixing broken logistics will rise significantly.

The question, then, is how Nigeria can make this shift.

Technology has a role to play. Today, one of the biggest constraints in Nigeria’s health supply chain is the difficulty of finding capable logistics providers. The country is home to many qualified providers able to deliver across the country, to the very last mile. Yet they often remain invisible to governments, donors, and manufacturers trying to move health products efficiently. This consistently results in a persistent mismatch between demand and supply, particularly during periods of heightened need.

Centralising this market – using technology to create a single, accessible space where buyers and logistics providers can find each other – therefore becomes important. Platforms like the Logistics Marketplace are beginning to address this by making qualified providers visible and streamlining procurement. Governments, global health partners, humanitarian agencies, and manufacturers can more easily identify, assess, and engage capable providers, turning existing capacity into capacity that is actually used.

But visibility at the system level is only part of the solution. The greater test is whether technology improves decision-making at the point of care. The goal should not be simply to track shipments, but to ensure that the person running a rural clinic knows what they have, what they are about to run out of, and how to trigger a resupply before patients are turned away. Without that level of visibility and agency at the frontline, digital tools risk becoming reporting mechanisms that serve the top of the system rather than the point of care.

Partnership with the private sector is equally central to closing this gap. Like in many other sectors, private logistics networks already move the majority of goods across Nigeria. Integrating this existing capacity into health delivery naturally becomes a practical way to extend reach without building parallel infrastructure. This must be structured so that integration is accountable, transparent, and performance-driven. Poorly designed collaborations carry risks, including inefficiency and diversion.

Senegal offers a lesson on how such partnerships could work. It was the first country to launch the “Zero Malaria Starts With Me” campaign, explicitly integrating the private sector into its response, and achieved a 73 percent reduction in malaria cases and a 13 percent decline in deaths between 2000 and 2019. Its progress was driven by strong national ownership, reliable data systems, and deliberate use of private sector capacity, including logistics. This is a model for what Nigeria could look like with stronger coordination between government and private logistics providers.

Rwanda also offers a complementary lesson on what is possible when delivery systems are treated as core infrastructure. Between 2016 and 2022, malaria incidence fell from 409 cases per 1,000 people to 76, while deaths dropped by more than 89 percent. These gains were not primarily driven by new drugs or major increases in funding, but by deliberate investment in delivery systems. Rwanda trained 30,000 community health workers to diagnose and treat malaria at home, built a reliable last-mile supply chain, and introduced data visibility so managers could act before shortages occurred. As a result, facility-level stockouts fell from around 10 percent to just 1 percent over five years. The lesson is that delivery system investment, not just health product investment, drives outcomes.

These successes are replicable in Nigeria, though we must not underestimate the intricacies of the country. Running reliable last-mile delivery across a country of more than 200 million people, with Nigeria’s geographic and infrastructure variation, is comparable to managing a commercial distribution network across multiple countries. But that level of complexity is not beyond reach. Nigeria already has the people, partners, and underlying capacity required – it now needs to coordinate them more effectively to deliver a reliable system.

Why This Matters

Nigeria's ability to reach nearly 29 million children through seasonal malaria chemoprevention demonstrates that the country can operate at scale. But the persistence of stockouts across more than half of surveyed health facilities in northern states shows that campaign-level ambition has not yet translated into routine system reliability — and it is the most underserved communities that bear the cost of that gap.

The experiences of Rwanda and Senegal suggest that this is a solvable problem. Both countries achieved significant reductions in malaria cases and deaths not by introducing entirely new tools, but by investing in delivery infrastructure, frontline capacity, and structured partnerships with the private sector. Nigeria already has many of these building blocks in place. The challenge is one of coordination, accountability, and sustained attention to the systems that move treatments from warehouses to the point of care.

With external health financing contracting, the window to make these investments is narrowing. Strengthening delivery systems now, while support still exists, is both the most practical and most equitable step Nigeria and other high-burden African countries can take to protect any malaria gains already made — and to ensure they last.

Prof. Lukoye Atwoli, International President of WHSRM 2026, pulled the conversation away from comfort. “One of the unspoken intentions of this convening” he said “is to make people a little uncomfortable by having difficult conversations.”

With over 3,000 participants, the scale of the gathering was evident, but for Atwoli, the convening’s significance also lay in the specific actions that would follow.

Prof. Axel R. Pries, President of the World Health Summit, followed by situating that responsibility within a wider shift. He emphasised that Africa’s health sovereignty can only be built through partnerships within countries, across regions and between sectors. He pointed to the need to move beyond fragmented, under-resourced arrangements toward more coordinated, sustainable and transparent systems that deliver at scale.

The Regional Director for WHO AFRO, Dr. Mohamed Janabi, brought the point down to practice. He noted that the summit showed what alignment can look like when governments, institutions and regions work together. For the first time, three WHO regions – AFRO, EMRO and Europe – came together around a shared agenda, reinforcing the idea that health threats do not respect borders and cannot be addressed in isolation.

“Telling people to wash hands means little if water is kilometres away,” he said, pointing to work in the Democratic Republic of Congo where partners installed water infrastructure, upgraded laboratories and strengthened local health facilities during an outbreak. The result was not just containment, but a more resilient system left behind.

By the time Deputy President of the Republic of Kenya, Prof. Kithure Kindiki took the floor, that message had settled into something firmer:

“The message from Nairobi 2026 is simple and direct. Africa’s health future will not be given to us. It will be built by us. It will require political courage, institutional discipline, sustained investment and an unshakable conviction that African lives matter equally on the global stage.”

His remarks brought together the key issues raised over the three days. Domestic financing, local manufacturing, and stronger institutions were no longer treated as aspirations but were presented as conditions for progress.

The summit also surfaced tangible signs of movement. Two stand out: the launch of a continental immunisation strategy and the establishment of a high-level ministerial committee on global health architecture reform.

What stood out in Nairobi was not the scale of the problem, but the direction of the response.

Whether that direction holds will depend on what follows — in how governments translate commitments into policy, institutions coordinate investment, and systems deliver in practice, not just on paper.

The conversation, moderated by AMREF Health Africa CEO, Dr Githinji Gitahi, began by highlighting the issue of trust. “Many Africans”, he noted, “still do not trust products made on the continent. It’s almost like the ones that are imported are more superior to the ones that we manufacture here and that narrative must change by creating globally acceptable quality products across the continent that are trusted.

Setting the tone for the session, Ibrahima Socé Fall, CEO of Institut Pasteur de Dakar (IPD), pushed back against the idea that sovereignty can simply be declared:

“Sovereignty cannot be just a slogan. We need to create the ecosystem. We need to be able to produce vaccine from end to end, starting with technical expertise, the talent and the workforce needed, this is the minimum requirement”

His point speaks to a deeper challenge facing African health systems. The shift from dependence on imported vaccines and diagnostics to building integrated, self-sustaining manufacturing capacity is complex. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the risks of that dependence, as global supply chains faltered and African countries found themselves at the back of the queue for life-saving products.

Fall pointed to Senegal’s experience as proof that progress is possible, while acknowledging how complex the path remains. At Institut Pasteur de Dakar, he noted, the organisation has expanded beyond its long-standing yellow fever vaccine production to invest in a vaccine research centre, clinical trials, and new candidates for diseases such as Marburg, Lassa fever and Rift Valley fever.

However, supply chains remain fragile and largely controlled from outside the continent. Africa still lacks a coherent market for its own products. Procurement systems dominated by global actors such as Gavi and UNICEF leave little room for African manufacturers to grow at scale.

Fall called for a continental approach. Countries need to align production with their comparative advantages and build a market that can sustain the industry over time.

From Kenya, Biovax Institute’s Richard Oduor reinforced the scale of the gap. Africa currently produces less than one percent of the vaccines it uses. Closing that gap would need more than infrastructure. It requires building capabilities across the entire value chain, from early-stage research and drug substance manufacturing to formulation, packaging, regulation and distribution.

For Biovax, the strategy is practical. Start where capacity already exists, such as fill and finish, then gradually build backward into more complex stages through technology transfer. Even this approach depends on sustained financing, strong negotiation capacity, and the ability to attract skilled talent back to the continent.

The session made one thing clear: Africa’s vaccine manufacturing ambitions will not be won in laboratories alone. They will be won in procurement rooms, policy conversations, and the long-term commitment to train and retain the scientists the continent is already producing. What remains missing is the coordinated architecture — the markets, financing, and political will — that turns isolated progress into continental self-reliance. Sovereignty, as Fall reminded the room, cannot be a slogan.

The session, “Trust in Science: Advancing Quality Health Information in the Age of Digital Health,” which was hosted by Nature Commission brought together Mercy Korir (Willow Health), Vivianne Ihekweazu (Nigeria Health Watch), Rebecca Ivic (University of Alabama), Nancy Booker (Aga Khan University), Ozge Tuncalp (Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp), Ben Johnson (Nature Commission), and Jacqueline Kitulu (World Medical Association).

Discussions reiterated how the health information landscape is quickly shifting. Digital platforms and artificial intelligence have expanded access to health information, but they have also made it harder to distinguish evidence from distortion.

Traditional gatekeepers of health information such as journals, ministries, and academic institutions no longer determine how information reaches the public. Today, social media platforms, messaging apps, and algorithm-driven feeds increasingly shape what people see, share, and believe.

Examples were made visible across African contexts.

Vivianne Ihekweazu, the managing director of Nigeria Health Watch described how digital platforms have transformed health communication, but also created a space where people often rely on peer networks and online sources over trained health professionals when making decisions.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, misinformation influenced health behaviours, including the use of unverified remedies and vaccine hesitancy in some communities. Those patterns have continued to shape how people engage with health systems long after the emergency phase ended.

“False information travels around the world as the truth is tying its shoes,”

said Mercy Korir of Willow Health, capturing the speed at which misinformation now moves compared to verified evidence.

For Jacqueline Kitulu, president of the World Medical Association, the issue is not only technical but ethical. “We are surrounded by health information, but much of it is unverified, misinterpreted, or deliberately misleading,” she said. “Patients have a right to reliable, evidence-based health information.”

Responses to this shift are beginning to take shape. Rebecca Ivic of the University of Alabama highlighted ongoing work to develop global indicators for assessing the quality of health information, while Booker, Tuncalp, and Johnson stressed the need for stronger governance frameworks and greater accountability in how evidence is produced, communicated, and acted upon.

The session closed with a clear consensus: no single intervention will fix the problem. Building trust requires working across multiple layers simultaneously — accurate information, relatable communication, stronger health literacy, and, importantly, coherence between what people encounter online and what they hear from health workers in clinics and communities.

For Africa, the urgency is clear. Health systems are already overstretched, and misinformation routinely outpaces the public health responses designed to counter it. In this environment, rebuilding trust in health information is not a secondary concern — it is as fundamental to survival as the care itself.

Over the past two decades, countries across Africa have made real progress. Expanded use of bed nets, improved diagnostics, effective treatments, seasonal prevention, and more recently malaria vaccines have saved millions of lives. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), malaria interventions have prevented over two billion cases and millions of deaths globally since 2000, with Africa accounting for the majority of those lives saved.

However, World Malaria Day presents us with an opportunity to ask a longer‑horizon question: what kind of progress will be needed to truly end malaria as a public health threat? Three observations stand out as essential in helping us guide our reflection and action;

(1) Strategies designed for control are not designed for permanence.

(2) Elimination is fundamentally about equity, reaching those who are consistently left out.

(3) Innovation must be understood broadly, as a portfolio of tools and approaches shaped and led by countries themselves to address malaria in a systemic way.

To truly eliminate malaria in Africa, one additional move is needed: beyond technical progress, we must work with our communities to understand and communicate that we are moving past the era of control toward permanently interrupting transmission. It is possible to eliminate malaria. This shift in mindset must be shaped with our communities.

The limits of strategies designed for control
Control has been highly effective at reducing deaths, particularly among children. But it relies on continuous repetition. Bed nets must be replaced, medicines restocked, prevention campaigns repeated year after year. Yet the most recent global data show that malaria cases and deaths remain heavily concentrated in the African region, which still accounts for around 94–95 percent of global malaria deaths, despite widespread coverage of core tools.

These patterns suggest that while control saves lives, it does not always interrupt transmission permanently. Elimination changes the way the problem is framed, shifting attention from managing malaria season after season to breaking the chain of transmission itself, reducing long‑term dependence on repeated interventions.

Malaria elimination is about equity
Malaria increasingly persists in the same places: remote rural areas, border communities, informal settlements, and regions where health systems face chronic constraints. WHO and partner analyses show that a relatively small number of high‑burden countries account for the majority of global malaria cases, even as national tool coverage improves.

Elimination refocuses attention on these remaining gaps. Beyond national averages, success takes into account whether transmission continues anywhere, and why. In that sense, elimination is also about equity, prioritising children and communities who are consistently hardest to reach and sometimes last to benefit. This requires deeper involvement of our communities, not only as recipients of interventions but as active partners and leaders in elimination efforts.

Country-led innovation is a game changer.
Innovation in malaria spans a broad portfolio: the roll‑out of new malaria vaccines now introduced in multiple African countries, next‑generation insecticide‑treated nets, improved diagnostics, enhanced surveillance systems, and approaches that seek to address malaria transmission at its source, alongside more precise delivery strategies.

According to WHO, the combined impact of new tools and improved delivery approaches saved more than a million lives globally in recent years alone, even as emerging challenges such as insecticide and drug resistance threaten existing gains. The core issue here is addressing the challenge in countries across Africa is not the use of any single tool, but how countries assemble the right mix of interventions for their national contexts.

Innovation is also about robust institutions. New approaches must be evaluated rigorously, regulated transparently, and shaped by national priorities. Community engagement is central to this process, and an integral part of how those decisions are made. Trust, governance, and leadership are as essential as technical effectiveness.

Across Africa, scientists, regulators, and public health institutions are already strengthening this capacity, building evidence, reinforcing regulatory oversight, and developing frameworks to govern innovation responsibly at the country level.

Why this matters

Taken together, these observations point in the same direction. Bed nets, treatment, preventive therapies, and vaccines remain indispensable. They are the reason millions of children are alive today. But relying on these tools alone keeps the global response oriented around containment. Complementing them with sustained investments aimed at elimination, stronger health systems, responsible innovation, regional coordination, and community leadership, opens the possibility of a different outcome. Centering community leadership and ownership alongside these investments strengthens the possibility of a different, lasting outcome.

Elimination is demanding. It requires long‑term commitment, cooperation across borders, and the patience to invest even when results are not immediate. But malaria has endured for centuries in part because it adapts to the spaces we leave unattended. Ending it will require sustained attention of a different kind, deliberate, collaborative, and forward‑looking.

World Malaria Day is a moment to reflect on whether we are ready to make that turn.

In 2000, Sierra Leone recorded 1,682 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births — the highest maternal mortality ratio in the world. By 2023, that figure had fallen to 354. Dr. Kenneth came to Abuja, Nigeria, not to celebrate that number, but to propose that West Africa builds the system behind it together.

Presenting the Freetown Charter, Dr. Kenneth was deliberate about what drives change. “The buzzword is not the technology. It is not the digitalisation that is going to save lives. Make no mistake, it is actually the decisions that we make and the actions that we take that change things. But digital and innovative technology can position us in such a way that we act fast in response, remain accountable and accurate, and make progress in a very short time.”

Sierra Leone’s journey illustrates exactly that. During the Ebola crisis, the country developed an electronic case-based disease surveillance system, shifting from aggregate to real-time reporting. That system was later adapted for maternal and child health. Every death is now reported immediately. Every week, a national review call connects leadership, specialists, district officers, UN partners, and regulatory bodies. A midwife’s absence, an unsigned supply document, a delayed referral —failures that once went undetected now surface within hours.

The data has also driven direct clinical decisions. When supply chain data flagged heat instability in oxytocin stocks, Sierra Leone switched to heat-stable carbetocin, reducing deaths from postpartum bleeding. When data revealed high anaemia rates, the country shifted from iron and folate to multiple micronutrient supplements. “Data must lead to action,” Dr. Kenneth told delegates.

The Freetown Charter proposes seven priority areas: Data governance and surveillance, Digital infrastructure and interoperability, Contextual and Innovation, Human capacity & workforce, Accountability & Performance, Data Sovereignty & Ethics, and Sustainable Financing. Its targets include institutionalising maternal and child death audits, adopting digital tracking tools across health facilities, and developing AI-based tools by 2030.

“This will not be the end, but the beginning of a collective effort to strengthen health systems across the region”

~ Dr. Satti Kenneth, Chief Medical Officer, Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone’s experience offers an early indication that the Charter’s ambitions are not merely aspirational, but actionable.

Drug resistance in West Africa is spreading and the region’s data systems are not keeping pace. Drug resistance is spreading across West Africa’s borders faster than the region’s surveillance systems can detect it.

This was the central concern raised during the session on West African Health Organisation's (WAHO) Regional Malaria Elimination Framework. A recurring call from health experts was for a regional network that allows Member States to share drug resistance data in real time. Strengthening monitoring committees to track both drug and insecticide resistance was seen as equally urgent. The reasoning was straightforward: resistant strains spread across borders faster than national surveillance systems can detect them. Without coordinated, cross-border data exchange, one country’s emerging resistance problem becomes a regional challenge.

Delegates stressed the need to translate these technical recommendations into ministerial-level resolutions to ensure formal adoption and accountability across Member States. Not recommendations that sit in a report - but commitments that bind governments to action.

“Each country already has its own national strategic plan. Our role as ECOWAS is to support, coordinate, and harmonise efforts across Member States.” said a WAHO Representative.

The conversation moved from data systems to the people those systems are meant to protect. Delegates emphasised the role of communities in malaria control - and specifically on who communities trust. Traditional and religious leaders, they argued, are central to health communication. Their formal integration into malaria strategies was strongly supported, with delegates noting that community acceptance of interventions, from bed-nets to vaccines, often hinges on endorsement from these figures.

Community health workers received similar attention. Already embedded at the front lines of care, they were recognised as essential actors in malaria surveillance. Delegates called for strengthened training and for malaria monitoring responsibilities to be formally incorporated into their roles, a practical step that costs relatively little but extends the reach of the entire framework.

Delegates called for the framework to explicitly address how gender shapes malaria exposure, healthcare access, and caregiving responsibilities. Urging that programming account for the different ways men and women experience and respond to malaria.

Private sector inclusion is also critical for the success of the framework, the experts emphasised. As private channels supply much of the region’s medicines, delegates raised concerns about the quality of medicines and the need for stronger regulatory compliance, noting that substandard and falsified medicines accelerate resistance. They called for local manufacturers to be engaged as active partners producing and supplying quality-assured medicines and commodities, reducing the region’s dependence on external suppliers.

Dr Monique Murindahabi, Global Health Expert and Consultant, presented a regional framework designed to move countries from fragmented control efforts to coordinated elimination by 2030.

Developed through expert consultations in Conakry in March 2025, the framework positions governance, data, commodities, innovation, and financing as interconnected levers for impact rather than isolated interventions.

At the centre is Pillar One: Governance and Coordination, which Dr Murindahabi described as the foundation of progress. While political commitment already exists through the African Leaders Malaria Alliance, she stressed that the real test lies in implementation. She called for stronger regional coordination mechanisms and cross-border collaboration, given that malaria does not respect national boundaries.

“Cross-border coordination is essential. Without harmonised cross-border collaboration and notification systems, malaria elimination will not be possible”

~ Dr Monique Murindahabi

Pillar Two: Data Systems, Surveillance, and Resistance focuses on strengthening regional intelligence. Although countries have improved use of District Health Information Software 2 (DHIS2) platforms, she called for a real-time ECOWAS malaria dashboard and stronger integration of national data systems. She also warned of rising drug and insecticide resistance, urging expanded molecular surveillance, digital tools such as geospatial mapping, and improved cross-border reporting.

Pillar Three: Treatment and Community Health Systems, Dr Murindahabi emphasised safeguarding first-line therapies while preparing for resistance through diversified treatment options. She emphasised community health workers as the backbone of early detection and response. “Community systems remain the first point of care and must be fully strengthened,” she said, also calling for better integration of private sector and traditional health actors.

Pillar Four: Manufacturing, Supply Chains, and Pooled Procurement addresses efficiency and equity in access to commodities. Dr Murindahabi proposed a regional pooled procurement system to reduce costs and prevent stock imbalances across countries. She also pointed to emerging innovations such as Nigeria’s planning model for malaria commodities and discussions on local manufacturing of mosquito nets as opportunities for regional scale-up.

Pillar Five: Research, Innovation, and Capacity Strengthening, calls for better use of existing laboratories, stronger regional research networks, and improved collaboration between academic institutions.

Pillar Six: Community Engagement and Behaviour Change focus on trust and ownership. Dr Murindahabi stressed that even effective interventions fail without community acceptance, urging engagement of traditional and religious leaders, alongside civil society, to drive uptake. “Elimination depends on communities understanding and owning the response,” she said.

The final pillar, Financing and Strategic Partnerships, highlights the need for increased domestic investment while leveraging regional and global partnerships. She called for innovative financing approaches and better integration of malaria into broader health financing systems.

Across all seven pillars, three principles were emphasised: strong governance, data-driven decision-making, and accountability. Dr Murindahabi concluded by stating that a malaria-free ECOWAS region is achievable, but only through coordinated action, sustained investment, and regional solidarity.

Malaria claims the lives of children under five nearly every minute with sub-Saharan Africa bearing the heaviest burden.

This sobering reality hung over the Health Experts Meeting in Sierra Leone, where WAHO presented two consequential documents: a Regional Malaria Elimination Framework and an account of how its budget is evolving. Together, they told one story. Ambition is not the problem. Money is.

The malaria framework, co-created with experts at a meeting in Conakry in March 2025, is structured around seven pillars: governance and coordination, surveillance and data systems, treatment and community health, supply chain and commodities, research and innovation, community engagement, and financing.

Dr. Monique Murindahabi, a WAHO consultant, who led the presentation was direct. “Malaria does not respect borders. We cannot talk about elimination if neighbouring regions do not align their policies.” Cross-border case notification, harmonised drug resistance protocols, pooled procurement, and a real-time regional disease dashboard are among the framework’s centrepieces.

The African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA) has already committed to elimination by 2030, however, participants pushed back on timelines.

On commodities, Dr. Murindahabi was equally explicit. “If we are serious about elimination, we must ensure that when a case arrives at a health facility, it is tested and treated. Commodities must therefore be available at all health facilities.”

Commodities, however, are only one part of the equation. The question of financing soon followed.

Dr Aruba Fallah, WAHO’s Director for Administration and Finance highlighted during his presentation that the WAHO’s approved budget has grown from roughly $47 million in 2018 to $71.6 million in 2025, a trajectory that looks healthy until you examine what is funding it. In 2018, external partners dominated, and by 2023, ECOWAS’s community levy had grown to surpass partner contributions, a sign of growing ownership.

However, the 2024 and 2025 figures are alarming. USAID, the African Development Bank, and Germany’s KfW — once pillars of WAHO’s external funding — have dramatically reduced from the ledger. In 2025, KfW accounted for 41% of remaining external funds, with USAID contributing just 2%.

Against that backdrop, Dr. Fallah set out an ambitious target.

"We have a projection to double our budget from $47 million in 2018 to $100 million in 2026… So there is a strong need for domestic resource mobilisation to achieve this"

~Dr. Aruba Fallah

The ambition is clear, but with ECOWAS covering just 26% of WAHO’s budget and traditional donors retreating, the path to $100 million runs through domestic resource mobilisation — a conversation the region can no longer defer.

This makes what comes next consequential.

“A malaria-free ECOWAS region is possible,” Dr. Murindahabi told delegates. “It is an achievable goal with political will, adequate investment, and regional solidarity.”

That solidarity must now be financial. Without it, West Africa’s boldest public health ambition risks becoming its most expensive unfulfilled promise.

At a webinar hosted by the World Health Organization Regional Office for Africa, researchers, clinicians, and care providers came together to examine what dementia means for Africa. While it is often viewed as a condition of old age, experts emphasised that its roots begin much earlier, calling for a shift in how the region understands dementia and responds to it.

Dementia is often mistaken for a normal part of ageing, which can make it easy to overlook in its early stages. In reality, it is not an inevitable part of growing older. It describes a group of conditions that affect memory, thinking, and the ability to carry out everyday activities, with Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia accounting for the majority of cases.

An estimated 57 million people were living with dementia globally in 2021, reflecting a growing but often under-recognised public health challenge. That number is projected to rise to 78 million by 2030 and reach 139 million by 2050, driven by ageing population and shifting disease patterns. More than 60% of cases are in low-and middle-income countries, where health systems are often least equipped to respond and where the gap in available care remains significant.

As this burden continues to grow, there is increasing attention at the global policy level. The political declaration of the fourth high-level meeting of the General Assembly on the prevention and control of noncommunicable diseases and the promotion of mental health and well-being, situates dementia within the broader NCD and mental health agenda, reflecting its growing recognition as a public health priority.

These realities were at the centre of a recent webinar hosted by the World Health Organization Regional Office for Africa, titled “Dementia in the African Region: Strengthening Policy on Integrated Care and Community Support for Older People.”

Dr Rwafa Madzvamutse, Regional Advisor for Mental Health at the World Health Organization Regional Office for Africa, in her presentation drew attention to the multiple and often intersecting factors shaping dementia risk in Africa. Beyond age, factors such as poorly managed HIV, harmful alcohol use, and nutritional deficiencies are increasingly recognised as contributors to cognitive decline.

Dr Madzvamutse also pointed to existing global frameworks, including the WHO Global Action Plan on the Public Health Response to Dementia, Action Plan on the Decade for Healthy Aging and broader mental health and healthy ageing strategies which provide a roadmap for countries to respond. However, it was noted that translating these commitments into practical, context-specific action remains uneven across Africa.

“57 million people worldwide live with dementia. This is as of 2021 we're expecting an exponential increase and that is up to 80 million by the end of the decade. 1 in 12 adults over sixty-five live with dementia, depending on the region. I am looking at the global data and over 60% of people who live with dementia actually live in low-and middle-income countries”

~ Dr Rwafa Madzvamutse

Insights from Nigeria and Kenya

Offering a practical perspective, Ekezie Ralueke Oluchukwu, a dementia care coach and founder of Blue Torch Home Care Ltd, shared how community-based care is being delivered in Nigeria. Founded in 2012, Blue Torch Home Care was established in response to the growing need for home-based support for older adults. Its model centres on integrating family involvement, community engagement, and professional care, recognising that for many people, care happens primarily at home.

Mr Oluchukwu emphasised that Blue Torch Home Care places strong emphasis on cultural context. Engagement with community leaders, use of familiar social structures, and culturally responsive care practices have helped improve acceptance and uptake of services. In settings where stigma and misconceptions remain, this approach has been critical in opening conversations and encouraging early support. While challenges like late diagnosis, workforce shortages, and financial barriers persist, Blue Torch’s model offers a glimpse of what is possible when care is designed around people’s lived realities and adapted to local contexts.

Additional evidence from rural eastern Uganda also shows how these challenges are unfolding across communities. Presenting findings from a three-year study, Dr Stephen Ojiambo Wandera, a gerontologist, population scientist and a member of the Technical Advisory Group for the UN Decade of Healthy Ageing, highlighted that about 12% of older adults were living with probable dementia, with prevalence increasing significantly with age and disproportionately affecting women.

Beyond age, the data pointed to a convergence of risk factors that are both widespread and, in many cases, preventable. More than half of the older adults studied were socially isolated, while rates of moderate to severe depression were strikingly high. Hypertension was also common, yet many participants were unaware of their status, showing gaps in routine screening and access to care.

In response to these diagnostic and system gaps, tools such as the Informant Dementia Severity Assessment (IDEA) are being used in Uganda, particularly in rural and resource-limited settings.

The tool, which assesses domains such as memory, orientation, verbal fluency, and visuospatial ability, is administered in local languages by trained health workers and is used to define cognitive impairment, with studies showing it to be effective in identifying dementia in community settings where low literacy and limited diagnostic capacity remain major challenges.

WHY THIS MATTERS

The discussion from the webinar shows that dementia in Africa is a social and systems challenge, beyond being seen as a clinical condition. Data from global policy tracking and the WHO Global Dementia Observatory proves that no African country currently has a fully implemented national dementia plan, with only a few, such as South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, and Ethiopia, having drafts that are yet to be operationalised.

Without a national plan, responses to dementia remain fragmented and underfunded. Care is often informal, falling largely on families and communities rather than being supported through structured health systems. This gap is becoming more concerning as Africa’s population ages and the burden of dementia rises. Projections suggest a sharp increase in the coming decades, which will place further strain on already limited care.