Gaborone — President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi has called on the World Health Organisation (WHO) and Member States to unleash the power of digital technologies to improve health and well-being of the people.
He said the new digital era brought opportunities to leverage on in order to improve health and well-being of the people provided they were delivered with intended quality without causing financial hardship.
Addressing the 73rd session of WHO Regional Committee for Africa in Gaborone Monday, President Masisi said Africa was standing at the crossroad of a digital health revolution that had the power to harness accessibility, quality and affordability of health services.
He said enhancing the digital era could unlock up to 15 per cent efficiency gains by 2030 and reinvest the savings to improve access and outcomes.
President Masisi said digital technologies had the potential to enhance health outcomes by improving medical diagnosis, data-based treatment decisions, digital therapeutics, clinical trials, self-care management and person-centred care as well as creating more evidence-based knowledge, skills and competence for professionals to support healthcare.
Additionally, he said COVID-19 pandemic had revealed enormous potential of the need for digital technology in the African Region.
He said it was important for governments to create an enabling environment, including through investment and policy as well as regulatory strengthening that would allow for a well-functioning digital health ecosystem.
President Masisi noted that the world had just emerged from an unprecedented health emergency and was currently in the midst of economic recovery faced with multiple challenges including worsening poverty, humanitarian crisis, food insecurity, increasing political instability and climate change.
He said the current situation had negative impacts on health and wellbeing. As a result, Dr Masisi said the world was not on track to meet Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that were to be achieved by 2030 owing to numerous errors of judgment.
He said there was a crucial need for enhanced international collaboration and global solidarity based on the lessons learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic.
He said WHO had estimated that around US$ 796 billion was lost in productivity value, which could be avoided by meeting health SDGs.
President Masisi commended WHO Director General, Dr Tedros Ghebreyesus for his sterling leadership during the global health emergency, as well as Director for the Africa Region, Dr Matshediso Moeti, for her remarkable contribution to global strategies to save lives and improve the health of the population in Africa.
He said WHO played a central role in global health governance as it was mandated with the advancement of health for all through strengthened health systems with the goal of attaining universal health coverage by 2030.
Dr Masisi acknowledged the substantial progress made in the African region leading to significant increase in life expectancy at birth.
In Sub-Saharan Africa, he said the average life expectancy at birth increased from 58 years in 2011 to 61 years in 2019 as a result of improvements in the provision of essential health services, improving to 46 per cent in 2019, compared with 24 per cent in 2000.
Furthermore, President Masisi said gains in reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health, as well as progress in the fight against infectious diseases and rapid scale-up of HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria control measures from 2005 were a result of improved provision of health services.
He also acknowledged some notable successes in the advancement of the health agenda, including eradication of smallpox, certification of wild polio virus in 2020, managing health emergencies such as Ebola virus disease, elimination of some neglected tropical diseases, as well as dealing with the non-communicable diseases in the region.
President Masisi said the inequities in access to vaccines, personal protective equipment and medicines during the COVID-19 pandemic would probably remain one of the major failures of the international community in the 21st century.
Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters
Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox
"In a globalised and highly interconnected world, the health concerns of developing countries should be a concern of the developed countries as well. Diseases have no borders, pandemics are global and therefore, the risks to one country invariably affect another," he said.
Dr Masisi said from the lessons learnt during the COVID-19 pandemic, the international community should work hard to ensure that a multilateral governance mechanism was in place for equitable access to vaccines, medicines, diagnostics and other medical products and tools. He said Botswana supported the need to maintain adequate regional stockpiles of pandemic health products such as vaccines, diagnostics and other necessary medical products while avoiding hoarding of such by wealthier countries.
BOPA
