African countries - The African Mirror

Jul

2021

This is no time to neglect hepatitis – 70 million Africans are infected

IN 2016, the World Health Organisation (WHO) set an ambitious target to eliminate viral hepatitis by 2030. This was followed by commitments from governments – including African countries – to develop national strategic plans for viral hepatitis and earmark resources to eliminate the disease. PAULINE BAKIBINGA, Associate Research Scientist, African Population and Health Research Center Hepatitis results in the inflammation of the liver. There are different forms of hepatitis – A, B, C, D and E – each attributed to a different type of virus. Unfortunately, most people who have the most serious forms of the disease, particularly the B…

Jul

2021

By The African Mirror

African countries call for $100 billion boost

COVID-19

LOUCOUMANE COULIBALY ELEVEN African heads of state have called for $100 billion in hardship funding to help dig their economies out of the hole caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Most African nations have been spared the levels of death and infection caused by the coronavirus in other parts of the world, but lockdowns and reduced travel and trade have thrown sub-Saharan Africa into recession. The leaders met in Ivory Coast's commercial capital Abidjan, where they produced a declaration asking for $100 billion for the period of 2022-2025 from the International Development Association (IDA), an arm of the World Bank Group…

Jul

2021

By The African Mirror

Africa needs fairness and vaccines to revive its tourism sector – minister

COVID-19

DUNCAN MIRIRI AFRICAN countries need to get equal access to COVID-19 vaccines so they can start rebuilding their devastated tourism industries, Kenya's tourism minister said on Friday. About 21 million jobs have been lost in the sector across the continent since the start of the pandemic, Najib Balala said on the sidelines of a meeting of his African counterparts, called by the United Nations to discuss the crisis. "Without the vaccination of hospitality workers, Africa will be isolated," he said. Africa has essentially had to pause its rollout of COVID-19 vaccines because of supply problems - and only 18 million…

Jul

2021

By The African Mirror

How African countries can reform education to get ahead after pandemic school closures

EDUCATION

THE COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a historic shock to education, shuttering schools for over 1.6 billion children worldwide. This shock will worsen a pre-existing “learning crisis” in which many students in school were learning very little. The World Bank estimates that the percentage of children who are unable to read a simple sentence by age 10 could rise from 53% before the pandemic to 63% as a result of school closures. NOAM ANGRIST, Executive Director, Young 1ove, Fellow, University of Oxford These learning losses could stem from a combination of things: forgetting what was previously known, and missing what…

Jul

2021

By The African Mirror

Understanding Ghana’s students is key to fixing the country

EDUCATION

A great many African countries had shown steady economic growth in the decade prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. But all have failed to adequately create opportunities for the young people in their countries. With growing youth populations, creating paths for education and employment is a make or break issue for the continent. KAJSA HALLBERG ADU, Researcher in Higher Education and Migration, KTH Royal Institute of Technology But there’s also good news. Many young people are getting access to secondary education and an increasing number also university education. An increasing share of youth in Africa are university students,…

May

2021

By The African Mirror

African countries must muscle up their support and fill massive R&D gap

HEALTH

IN a recent open letter to international funders for research and development, we highlighted multiple power imbalances and appealed to the funders to help build a more equitable ecosystem. JANET MIDEGA, PhD, Senior Research Advisor, Wellcome Trust, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme CATHERINE KYOBUTUNGI, Executive Director, African Population and Health Research Center Emelda Okiro, Head of Population Health Unit, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme FREDROS OKUMU, Director of Science, Ifakara Health Institute IFEYINWA ANIEBO, Research fellow (Harvard Takemi fellow), Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health NGOZI ERONDU, Senior Scholar with the Global Health Policy & Politics Initiative at the…

May

2021

By The African Mirror

African countries must embrace the concept of good food as good medicine

SCIENCE, TECH AND INNOVATION

FRESH impetus is being directed into identifying and advocating for scientific priorities in the area of food security and nutrition across Africa, with a particular focus on health implications. CHARLES WAMBEBE, Professor Extraordinaire, Tshwane University of Technology At the centre of these efforts is a five-year project initiated by the Alliance for Accelerating Excellence in Africa, a partnership between the African Academy of Sciences and the African Union Development Agency-NEPAD. This project aims to identify the continent’s most urgent research and development questions, and to advocate for investments in these areas. This will go a long way in helping the…

May

2021

By The African Mirror

New drugs work against the many strains of hepatitis C found in African countries

HEALTH

AROUND the world, 71 million people have been infected with the hepatitis C virus. The primary route of infection is through direct contact with another person’s blood. This means the virus can be transmitted in a number of ways, including intravenous drug use, tattooing, contaminated blood or blood products and surgical procedures. JOHN MCLAUCHLAN, Professor of Viral Hepatitis, University of Glasgow Infection with this virus can lead to severe disease of the liver. Annually, there are about 400,000 deaths resulting from the effects of infection. If the body fails to naturally clear the virus within a few weeks of initial…

May

2021

By The African Mirror

Why renewable energy won’t end energy poverty in Zimbabwe

ENVIRONMENT

ZIMBABWE is one of the African countries that hopes renewable energy technologies will help to address their energy problems. About 42% of Zimbabwe’s households are connected to the electricity grid. ELLEN FUNGISAI CHIPANGO, Postdoctoral research fellow, University of Johannesburg The country has huge and diverse renewable energy potential. Its sustainable energy portfolio could include solar, hydro, biomass and, to a limited extent, wind and geothermal. Zimbabwe put forward a National Renewable Energy Policy in 2019. The policy aims to have 16.5% of the total generation capacity (excluding large hydro) from renewable sources by 2025. This increases to 26.5% by 2030.…

Apr

2021

By The African Mirror

Congo shares expiring vaccines with other African countries

COVID-19

THE Democratic Republic of Congo has begun re-deploying hundreds of thousands of COVID-19 vaccines to other African nations which it says it won't be able to administer before they expire at the end of June, its health minister has said. Yesterday, afternoon a plane from Angola picked up almost half a million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which had been supplied to Congo through the COVAX vaccine-sharing facility on March 2. Congo delayed its rollout after several European countries suspended use of the AstraZeneca shot in response to reports of rare blood clots. Ghana, Togo, Central African Republic and Madagascar…