Ethiopian Informer
ADDIS ABABA (EI): The plight of Africa’s skilled health workforce to countries outside the continent, predominantly towards higher-income nations, posed a “critical challenge” to the sustainability and resilience of health systems in Africa, according to a new Africa CDC report.
The newly-published report by the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) emphasized that the plight of Africa’s health workforce outside the continent has caused a “far-reaching” impact on public health in Africa.
The report warned that the loss of skilled personnel is “worsening Africa’s already dire health workforce shortages, undermining healthcare delivery capacity, and impeding progress towards achieving Universal Health Coverage and the African Union’s Agenda 2063.”
The Africa CDC report—which analyzed out-migration of health workers with case studies of Nigeria, Rwanda, and Zambia—indicated that the phenomenon is “a critical challenge to the sustainability and resilience of health systems in Africa.”
According to the report, the economic consequences of health worker migration are far-reaching. Modeling scenarios project that by 2063, under the status quo of inadequate health worker numbers, the continent could face cumulative losses of approximately 1.4 trillion US Dollars.
It said considering “more ambitious scenarios” with improved health worker densities, the projected losses as a result of economic consequences of health worker migration still remain significant, estimated at 431 billion US Dollars.
(Photo credit Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC)
