WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged African leaders to strengthen health systems and tackle the root causes of disease as the continent looks to reduce its reliance on external health funding.
"The same challenge runs through maternal health, tuberculosis, malaria, neglected tropical diseases, and rising non-communicable diseases. These are not separate crises; they are one crisis. Health systems are not yet strong enough to protect every person on this continent. In our Africa, conflict also makes this harder."
He added that weak health systems and conflict continued to undermine healthcare, citing the Ebola outbreak in eastern DR Congo, where fighting has disrupted response efforts.
The African Union said AIDS-related deaths have fallen by 74% since 2004 but warned that those gains are increasingly at risk as external funding declines.
"Our continent is still home to two thirds of the 40 million people living with HIV worldwide. A true tragedy. But the more encouraging fact is that AIDS-related deaths have fallen by nearly three quarters since their peak. Right there is the proof we need that when we rise to the occasion, our problems will crumble at our feet," stressed Ghanaian President John Mahama.
"Africa has faced overlapping waves of pandemics, never fully recovering from one before confronting another one. HIV, Mpox, COVID, Marburg, and Ebola. The Global Council on Inequality, Aids and Pandemics, which I convene, found that pandemics and inequality reinforce one another in a vicious cycle. Inequalities allow outbreaks to become pandemics. Pandemics, in turn, deepen inequalities within and between countries, and then they become more vulnerable to the next pandemic," states Ugandan human rights activist Winnie Byanyima.
African heads of state and senior officials met in Accra on Wednesday to discuss a continental health compact aimed at strengthening health systems, accelerating efforts to end AIDS and tuberculosis by 2030, expanding universal health coverage and increasing domestic health financing.