From Timothy Olanrewaju, Maiduguri
Health experts, innovators and stakeholders have called for stronger action and collaboration to provide solutions to common healthcare challenges and services in African nations.
The experts and stakeholders made the call during a health summit webinar yesterday organised by the Senegal-based regional health innovation campaigner, Galien Africa, with about 200 journalists from African nations under the auspices of African Journalists Network for the Promotion of Health and Environment (REMAPSEN) and other international bodies.
Chair of Galien Africa, Prof. Awa Marie Seck, in her opening remarks, said Africa presently stands at the intersection of multiple crises, including health, climate and environmental as well as food-related crises.
“This webinar, therefore, was dedicated to ‘One Health in Africa: From Declaration to Action,’” she disclosed. She further explained that it was meant to move from conversation to real action.
She said Africa has both human and innovative capacities, requiring exposure and strategy to be at the heart of global solutions to the health crisis.
Prof Seck, however, maintained that such a position in health solution requires three major transformations, including scaling up and amplifying innovations by Africans.
She highlighted changing the paradigm, African approach and responses to health issues and having control over health data as part of the transformation needed in the continent.
“Without control over our data, without the capacity to produce our own solutions, there can be no health sovereignty,” she maintained.
Permanent Secretary of the National High Council for One Health Public Health Security in Senegal, Dr. Adjaratou Diakhou advocated for stronger multi-sectoral collaboration to tackle emerging global health challenges.
She urged African countries to use satellite images and data to address health-care challenges.
The President of the Congolese Foundation for Medical Research, Prof Francine Ntoumi and the Head of Public Health Department at Amadou Hampton Ba, University in Senegal, Prof Issaka Diallo, also called for urgent national government investment in innovation and health sovereignty across Africa.
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