Senegal News

Dakar – As antimicrobial resistance silently threatens global health, a Senegalese expert stands out as one of the continent’s most committed voices. Moving between lecture halls and fieldwork, Dr Oumar Bassoum turns challenges into opportunities to protect the  common good: preserving the effectiveness of antibiotics.

Dakar ‒ Prostate cancer is one of the most common male cancers on the African continent. Studies report high incidence and mortality rates among African men compared to men of other origins. This is explained by a combination of biological, genetic and social factors.

Dakar – Alors que la promesse de la Couverture sanitaire universelle (CSU) reste encore inachevée pour des millions d’Africains, l’Organisation mondiale de la Santé (OMS) a lancé, en collaboration avec la Banque mondiale et l’Institut africain de statistique (STATAFRIC) de l’Union africaine, une formation sous-régionale visant à renforcer la capacité des pays à mesurer et à suivre la protection financière en santé.

Dakar - On July 1, 2025, Senegal officially launched the introduction of the hexavalent vaccine into its Expanded Program on Immunization (EPI). Following in Mauritania's footsteps, Senegal is part of this regional dynamic of vaccine innovation. This vaccine is a combination that protects against six diseases: diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, hepatitis B, Haemophilus influenzae type B (Hib), and poliomyelitis. It replaces the pentavalent and inactivated polio vaccines (IPV), previously administered separately.

Dakar – Ndèye, 29, mother of three children and living in Guédiawaye in the outskirts of Dakar, says she has always had difficult pregnancies. “I gave birth at home for my first two pregnancies, and for my last child, the beginning was difficult. I was dizzy all the time and felt very tired, and yet I told myself that it would pass, that it was normal,” she explains.

Dakar – Senegal has become the first country in Africa to receive World Health Organization (WHO) classification for developing the capacity of its emergency medical team to be able to deploy and respond to health crises around the world, marking an historic milestone for the country and significantly boosting the African Region’s emergency response capacity.

Dakar – ​​​​In Senegal, as in most countries in the African region, hospital-acquired infections are a major challenge. Also known as nosocomial infections, they are among the most frequently observed adverse events in the context of health service delivery. According to estimates from World Health Organization (WHO), in high-income countries seven out of 100 patients hospitalized in intensive care will contract at least one nosocomial infection during their stay in hospital. In low- or middle-income countries this number rises to 15.

Dakar – Awa has never forgotten the day of her circumcision, at just nine years of age. « They cut me with a knife, without anaesthetic, with just a piece of cloth in my mouth to muffle my screams," she recalls. 

Now, aged 25 and living in Kolda in the south of Senegal, Awa has become an activist against female genital mutilation (FGM), any procedure involving the partial or total removal of a woman's external genitalia, or any other injury to the female genital organs that is performed for non-medical reasons.