Kagame who doubles as the Chairperson of the African Union made the remarks as he chaired the African Leadership Meeting on Investing in Health held in Addis Ababa ahead the 32nd African Union Summit.
The meeting has brought together African Heads of State and Government, business leaders and global health organisations to launch a new initiative designed to help deliver increased, sustained and more impactful financing for health across Africa.
In his remarks, Kagame said, “Investing in the health of our citizens has already had transformative effects on the people of our continent. But there is much more to do. We will get better results if we work together as a continent.”
“We also have a lot to learn from each other’s experiences implementing programmes such as universal health insurance, and community-based healthcare,” Kagame said.
According to the 2018 WHO Global Health Expenditure Database, only two out of the 55 AU Member States meet Africa’s target of dedicating at least 15% of the government budget to health and do not reach the suggested threshold of US$86.30 per person required to provide a basic package of health services.
Here, Kagame called on the governments to increase domestic investment in healthcare.
“Governments should surely be willing and able to increase domestic investment in healthcare. A good indicator of this is the progress we have made toward securing the financial health of the African Union and mobilising our own resources for joint priorities, such as the Peace Fund. We should be the first ones to contribute to efforts that directly benefit our people,” Kagame said.
“We are entering a period where most of the special health financing vehicles must replenish their resources. This creates the necessity—or rather the opportunity— for Africa to increase its ownership of the process. Together we can set an even more ambitious agenda for the next phase,” he emphasized.
Kagame also called on private companies to invest more in the business of healthcare in Africa.
“The private sector is the key to success. The role goes beyond taxes and philanthropy as central as those are. We also need to see the private sector investing more in the business of healthcare in Africa as service providers,” he said.
Kagame also noted that companies can also ensure their employees have high-quality, private health insurance coverage and this creates more demand in the market, and allows governments to focus on the most vulnerable.
Leave a Reply