Maputo, 4 Nov (AIM) – The time has come for Africa to start embracing new initiatives to finance resilient health systems by engaging the business community and promoting philanthropic movements, says Dr Otto Chabikuli, head of the Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office (ESARO) at the human development organization, FHI 360.
It is commonly agreed among the scientific community that the African continent, and Southern Africa in particular, is the region most vulnerable to climate change, particularly extreme weather events, with an increasing frequency and severity of epidemic outbreaks, malnutrition, and chronic disease, including mental illness and trauma.
One of the most immediate impacts of climate change is the destruction of health facilities and disruption in the provision of essential health services.
That is why AIM decided to interview Dr. Otto Chabikuli ahead of the forthcoming 3rd International Conference on Public Health in Africa (CPHIA 2023) that will take place in Lusaka, under the theme “Breaking Barriers: Repositioning Africa in the Global Health Architecture”
Chabikuli, who will participate in a panel on philanthropic movements for addressing public health issues, explained the relevance of the initiative, for mobilizing much needed financial resources.
“My understanding is that it’s not enough for Africans to set their own agenda. It’s not enough for Africans to say that we own the agenda if we don’t pay for it”, says Chabikuli.
“So, what we are trying to do with this panel is talk about philanthropy and donors who are Africans because our continent now has many millionaires with big businesses who should create their own foundations to finance health initiatives like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet”, said Chabikuli.
He argued that the most pressing issue for the continent should be how to harvest the wealth of these sons and daughters of Africa to further boost the public health agenda.
“With our panel on philanthropy”, says Chabikuli, “we want to demonstrate to them that 100,000 dollars may not mean a lot to those African millionaires because that’s what they may spend during a holiday in the United States but that sum could save thousands of lives in Africa”.
As for the event, Chabikuli said one of the most exciting thing that has happened to Africa is to have a public health conference that is organized by Africans, led by Africans and, most important, with an agenda set by Africans.
This is the 3rd conference and, according to Dr. Chabikuli, there is an increasing number of people who want to come and attend.
“In the past if we wanted to attend an international public health conference we would have to travel to Europe etc. Now all of that is happening in Africa”, he said. “This is really great because it gives Africans an opportunity to set our own agenda”.
According to Chabikuli, a number of Heads of State and Government and ministers are expected to attend the conference as well as academics and researchers from Africa. He hopes that this interaction between scientists and researchers, will help shape policies tailored precisely for African problems.
Indeed, the meeting will help build the capacity of Africans and carry the voices of African scientists and public health workers.
As for the resilience of health systems in African countries such as Mozambique, Nigeria, Kenya, and South Africa among others, Chabikuli believes that they been tested enough particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic.
He noted that, when Covid-19 hit the world and people started dying in Italy, the United Kingdom, the USA and other western countries, many people, including scientists, thought it would be the end of Africa. But they could not have been further from the truth.
Indeed, most African countries, including Mozambique reported far fewer deaths from Covid-19 than the rest of the world.
He believed that African countries, such as Mozambique, relied considerably on a vast network of health workers and existing infrastructures that were set up in past to manage epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis, and to run vaccination campaigns.
This led Chabikuli to state that the amount of resources deployed by African countries at the community level right now is an important feature of the resilience that other countries, particularly in Europe and the USA, do not have.
“We have community health workers in almost every village and we have volunteers. In Mozambique there are thousands of them in the community, some working on HIV, others on TB, others on vaccination, helping on a day to day basis”.
In the event of another pandemic, he added, African countries will be better prepared because these community health workers, who are within the community, are already trained and will be able to go and help almost immediately in case of an emergency.
“So, we don’t have to wait for people to fly out from the United States, or Portugal to come and help because there are already people that only need some resources to immediately start providing support to their neighbours”, Chabikuli said.
“I think that’s one important feature of the resilience of African health systems”, he stressed. “Africa is leading the world by demonstrating how we can leverage the resources of our communities through the network of community health workers to quickly respond to an emergency.
(AIM)
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(AIM / AIMENG)
