This post was written by Jeffrey L. Sturchio, president and CEO of the Global Health Council.
Recently I had the opportunity to spend time with senior health officials from several African countries as part of the annual African Health Delegation visit organized by Global Health Progress. The theme of the week—“Accelerating Progress Through Strengthened Partnerships”—points to the growing attention to collaboration at all levels as an effective approach to solving critical global health challenges. The Brazzaville Declaration adopted earlier this month by the first Africa Regional Ministerial Consultation on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) also acknowledges the importance of partnerships, alliances and networks that join academic and research institutions, public and private sectors, and civil society as vital tools in the prevention and control of cancers, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and respiratory illness.
But the notion of partnership also raises important questions about what we mean by the term: Who makes the decisions? Who controls the money? How do partnerships fit with country ownership of health strategies and action plans? African health ministries must grapple with the pragmatic issues of addressing a broad spectrum of public health challenges with scarce financial and human resources, often while juggling myriad inquiries and disparate reporting requirements from many well-intentioned development partners. The members of the African Health Delegation had a range of questions and discerning observations for us about how to put real country ownership into practice, while their comments about practices in their countries (ranging from the complex federal system in Nigeria to the smaller, yet still complicated situations in countries like Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland) clarified the issues of partnership for the mix of academic, NGO and private sector leaders in their audiences in both Washington, DC, and New York. The perspectives that delegation members offered on the questions we discussed were illuminating and informative. The lively exchanges at the events I attended reinforced a basic insight: global health policy can’t be designed in a vacuum, and there’s no substitute for local knowledge of what works and what doesn’t. Continue reading
Leading health officials from eight sub-Saharan African countries have just completed a weeklong visit to Washington (June 21 to June 25) hosted by Global Health Progress (GHP), where they highlighted successful public-private partnerships in addressing critical health challenges in Africa and stressed the need for continued US public support to strengthen African health care systems. 
In this issue:
President Kagame calls for strong health leadership
In this issue:
Headlines: Africa on track to malaria milestone, Novartis releases child friendly antimalarial, global community redoubles efforts to eradicate polio, African initiative launched to fund local health research in Kenya and Malawi, delegation visits East Africa to explore partnerships, Coca-Cola commits $30 million for clean water in Africa, promising results for women’s microbicide gel, African entrepreneurs promote sustainable sanitation solutions. 
Dr. Karabo Mokobocho-Mohlakoana is Principal Secretary at the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare in Lesotho. She was in Washington on the week of April 20 as part of a delegation of senior health officials from 11 African countries and the African Union under the aegis of Global Health Progress, an initiative to bring research-based biopharmaceutical companies and global health leaders together to improve health in the developing world. In this interview, she discusses how Lesotho and its partners are tackling the country’s health challenges.
More than 40% of people living in malaria-endemic countries in Africa now have access to long-lasting insecticide-treated mosquito nets (LLINs), putting the continent almost halfway to the UN goal of providing 100% of those in endemic countries with malaria control interventions by 2010, according to a new United Nations report.
