AMR, Focus on Africa, Global Funding in National Budgets, L’Initiative’s work on TB, DREAMS PrEP Ambassador

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Aidspan

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Article Number: 1

With Africa having the highest mortality to AMR, and the highest burden of disease, we bring articles on AMR in Africa and the hollowing of health systems in the region due to the recruitment of health professionals from Africa for the developed countries. We have interviews with Adeline Battier, L’Initiative and Tanyaradzwa Makotore, DREAMS PrEP ambassador, Zimbabwe. There’s also an article from the Global Fund Forum regarding enhancing health sector management: Lessons from Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, and The Gambia.

Our September newsletter is book-ended with interviews with women making a mark in health systems strengthening. We open with an interview with Adeline Battier, of L’ Initiative /Expertise France, conducted by Christian Djoko during the regional meeting in Yaoundé from June 11 to 13, 2024, on advancing community, rights and gender for an equitable response to tuberculosis in Francophone Africa. The article is translated by Amida Kariburyo from our French counterpart Observateur du Fonds Mondial (OFM). And we end with another interview with Tanyaradzwa Makotore, DREAMS PrEP ambassador, Zimbabwe by George Njenga Kiai. Makotore has transformed health communication in her country by transitioning from a promising career in engineering to sexual and reproductive health and rights SRHR advocacy. Her innovative approaches include leveraging grassroots engagement, tailoring messages to local cultures, and addressing HIV/AIDS stigma.

 

In light of the upcoming United Nations High-Level Meeting on antimicrobial resistance (AMR) for the second time during its General Assembly’s 79th session in New York on September 26, 2024, we have a focus on AMR in Africa, which has the world’s highest mortality due to AMR. We bring to you some research studies and some of the data from the African Union AMR Landmark Report, which outlines the threat and priority actions to tackle it.

 

It is to be noted that AMR threatens not just us here but astronauts in space as well! Recent news reports pointed out that 13 strains of a multidrug resistant bacterium or a superbug as it’s called was found on the International Space Station!

 

The focus on Africa continues in another article on the international recruitment of healthcare professionals from the Global South by the Global North weakening the health systems in the developing nations and placing human resources in health who choose to stay under severe strain. As International Council of Nurses CEO Howard Catton put it while speaking on the World Radio Switzerland Breakfast Show, “from ethics, from the health, from the economic perspectives we need to address this, that’s why we’ve written to the G20 saying this needs to be on their agenda, when they meet later this year.” The article by Christian Djoko and Jessica Ekelru is translated by Amida Kariburyo from our French counterpart Observateur du Fonds Mondial (OFM).

 

In this newsletter is also the last in the series of articles penned by Samuel Muniu on the Global Fund Forum on public financial management, convened in July 2024. His article is about enhancing health sector management: lessons from Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, and The Gambia on integrating development partners’ funding into national budgets.

 

So, that’s it from us for now. Any thoughts about which aspect in the global health initiative sector you’d like to see covered in our newsletter are always welcome and we’d really appreciate suggestions on who can pen an article on it! Anyone who wishes to voluntarily contribute as a guest columnist and provide an incisive analysis or first-person account of what is happening at micro – or macro – levels in the field of global health interventions is also welcome. Any feedback and suggestions in French, Spanish, English can be sent to Ida Hakizinka ida.hakizinka@aidspan.org and/or in English to madhuri@aidspan.org

 

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