News Releases

Antananarivo – Quality assurance surveyor Anja Mandimbisoa arrives at a random lot numerically selected, throws her pen in the air, and whichever house it is pointing at when it lands is the next on her evaluation list. With their consent, she then sits down with the family to verify whether the children in the household have the mark on their little fingers confirming they have been vaccinated against polio.

Freetown ‒ Sierra Leone has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world, with 717 mothers dying annually for every 100 000 live births as of 2019 (DHS, 2019). One of the primary contributing factors is delayed first visits to health facilities by mothers-to-be. Provision of quality preconception, antenatal, intrapartum and postnatal care to all mothers in also inequitable. High out-of-pocket expenditure for accessing basic care, as well as inadequate delivery of patient-centered care at both primary and secondary levels, compound the challenges.

Gaborone – African health ministers today endorsed a regional strategy to ramp up action against antimicrobial resistance, which is estimated to have directly contributed to 1.27 million deaths in sub-Saharan Africa in 2019.

The region faces a high burden of antimicrobial resistance, which occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites change over time and no longer respond to medicines, making infections harder to treat. Globally, around 10 million people – including 4.1 million in the African region – are projected to die of antimicrobial resistance by 2050.