Africa Archives - Mediarabe

Opening Remarks at Mobilizing with Africa II High-Level Virtual Event

October 12, 2020

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Opening Remarks at Mobilizing with Africa II High-Level Virtual Event

By Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva

October 9, 2020

As prepared for delivery

Excellencies, Ministers, Ladies and Gentlemen—thank you for participating in this important event. I am honored to co-host with President Malpass. And I would like to recognize U.N. Secretary General Guterres and AU Commission Chair Moussa Faki Mahamat.

We are here today because COVID-19 continues its assault on the health and wellbeing of people, and on the economy.

In Africa, there are more than a million cases. 23,000 deaths confirmed; countless others unconfirmed. Jobs lost, family incomes down 12 percent. And, according to our colleagues at the World Bank, up to 43 million more people are at risk of extreme poverty, reversing a trend we have

Why Africa needs to invest in mental health

October 12, 2020

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More than 13% of the global burden of disease is due to disorders such as depression, anxiety, schizophrenia and substance abuse. Almost three-quarters of this burden lies in low- and middle-income countries, because of extremely scarce health resources and investment. Many countries allocate less than 1% of the health budget to mental health. Poor or non-existent access to evidence-based care also leads to the need for long-term care and increased costs of care.

The economic burden is also significant. The global cost of lost productivity due to depression and anxiety disorders is an estimated US$1.15 trillion a year. Around 4.7 billion days of productivity are lost.

There is good evidence that these conditions are treatable. But the estimates of people in sub-Saharan Africa receiving treatment are jarring. Only 15% of South Africans with mental health conditions receive treatment. In Ghana and Ethiopia the estimates are less than 10%.

We’ve spent

CWRU and UH secure $4 million to establish research center focused on lung cancer in East Africa

October 10, 2020

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Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Oct 9 2020

Researchers with the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center (UHCMC) have secured $4 million in funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH)/National Cancer Institute (NCI) to establish an HIV-associated Malignancy Research Center (HAMRC) focused on lung cancer in East Africa.

The team will collaborate with Ugandan and Tanzanian researchers at the Joint Clinical Research Centre in Kampala, Makerere University Lung Institute, Uganda Cancer Institute, Mulago National Hospital, National Institute for Medical Research (NIMR), Muhumbili National Hospital and the Ocean Road Cancer Institute. The HAMRC will investigate novel approaches to characterize lung cancer epidemiology, somatic mutation burden, HIV and accelerated aging, and radiological features of lung cancer and the relationship to HIV-1 infection.

The focus of this new research center includes establishing national lung cancer diagnostic referral networks in Uganda and Tanzania, teleradiology telepathology, technology

Why coronavirus has been less deadly in Africa

October 8, 2020

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Many African countries have been praised for waging an effective campaign to combat the spread of coronavirus despite their reputation for having fragile state heath systems.

The continent, which has a population of more than one billion, has had about 1.5 million cases, according to data compiled by the John Hopkins University.

Africa has recorded about 37,000 deaths, compared with roughly 580,000 in the Americas, 230,000 in Europe, and 205,000 in Asia.

These figures are far lower than those in Europe, Asia or the Americas, with reported cases continuing to decline.

“The case-fatality ratio (CFR) for Covid-19 in Africa is lower than the global CFR, suggesting the outcomes have been less severe among African populations,” noted a recent continental study by Partnership for Evidence-based Response to Covid-19 (PERC), which brings together a number of private and public organisations.

Low testing rates continue to undermine the continental response

The Latest: Africa CDC: International traveling platform

October 5, 2020

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JOHANNESBURG — African governments have worked together to launch a digital platform to inform travelers about COVID-19 travel restrictions across the continent, as many countries ease restrictions on international travel.

Still reeling from nearly six months of a ban on international travel to avoid the spread of the coronavirus, major airports on the continent have now resumed international flights, but with specific restrictions.

The #Trusted Travel, My COVID Pass, will provide travelers in Africa with information about what requirements they will face going to different countries in the continent, the head of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr.John Nkengasong, said Monday.

The digital platform will also offer links to laboratories where travelers will be able to get the COVID-19 test results that are required for entry into many African countries, said Nkengason on an Africa CDC internet press conference.

Some of the continent’s largest laboratory firms have

Africa CDC upgrades skills of 20 community health workers in Lagos State

September 29, 2020

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By Sola Ogundipe

Towards boosting the COVID-19 response in Lagos State, 20 Community Health Workers, and one supervisor from the 20 Local Government Areas of the State have been trained by the African Centre for Disease Control, Africa CDC, to be proficient in contact tracing and monitoring.

In a chat with Good Health Weekly, a lead facilitator, Dr Olayinka Ilesanmi, said the goal is to increase contact tracing skills of health workers to enable the detecting of infected persons at the community level.

“Once persons present with symptoms, and all the contacts can be identified, it would cut down the risk of its spread. The higher the number of contacts identified, the greater the chances of limiting the spread. It is one of the ways of breaking the chain of transmission.”

Further, Ilesanmi who is the African CDC COVID-19 Event-Based Epi-analyst said the whole idea is to fulfill the Partnership

South Africa: Educating the Innovators for Community Mental Health Promotion

September 28, 2020

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The many tolls of COVID-19 will be counted and measured. It’s likely though, that we’ll never get a clear picture of the pandemic’s impact on our mental health. Yes, the suicides are being tallied up, but mental health issues manifest in many more ways. Mental healthcare is the poor, neglected orphan of healthcare services. While there’s far more focus than there has ever been on the importance of mental health; the majority of people with mental health concerns do not access the care they need to heal and transform their lives. This is particularly the case in South Africa, where the need is staggeringly high and exacerbated by widespread chronic poverty, crime, unemployment, violence, disease, discrimination and domestic abuse. Now, COVID-19 has ushered in a sustained crisis of fear and anxiety, trauma and grief.

According to Dr Jaclyn Lotter, the Deputy Dean at SACAP (the South African College of Applied

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