INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT
SPOTLIGHT ON HEALTHCARE IN WEST AFRICA Exploring a borderless future for the health sector in West Africa in the wake of COVID-19 Writer: Phoebe Harper | Project Manager: Krisha Canlas
T
he healthcare sector across Africa is fraught with challenges. Faced with limited infrastructure, critical care capacity, and extreme labour shortages worsened by talent migration, the conditions facing the continent’s most fragile health systems have been exacerbated by the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic. Indeed, the level of skilled
36 | Africa Outlook issue 96
health workers across the continent as a whole has now fallen 60 percent below the United Nation’s minimum threshold. According to a McKinsey report, sub-Saharan Africa has only one to five percent of the ICU beds per capita, compared to European and East Asian countries, while the population bears nearly twice the disease burden per capita, measured by disability-adjusted life
