Kenya has commended the African Union and the Africa Business Council report on Healthcare and Economic Growth in Africa.
The report was launched during the Africa Business Health Forum side meeting of the African Union summit, attended by the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Sicily Kariuki on behalf of His Excellency President Uhuru Kenyatta.
The CS said that the Government of Kenya recognizes the important role of Public Private Partnerships (PPP) in complementing government initiatives in health service delivery, which she acknowledged has catalyzed progress towards attainment of Social Development Goals (SDGs) and Universal Health Coverage.
She pointed out that Kenya has established an SDG Partnership Platform as a high-level collaboration with the UN system in Kenya and other stakeholders in pursuit of accelerating the attainment of the SDGs through multi-stakeholder and cross-sectoral partnerships.
The Platform aims to scale up transformative primary health care interventions to improve health and well-being of Kenyans and support the attainment of Kenya’s Universal Healthcare agenda, she said.
The goal is to utilize the SDG Partnership Platform as a vehicle for galvanizing more support from both the private sector, including philanthropic efforts, she noted.
“Since the launch of the SDG Platform, we have witnessed a multiplicity of development partnerships, from the global level down to local communities,” she said.
The CS said the Government has initiated several policy initiatives such as public private partnership since 2013, and is willing to explore incentives for expansion of the private sector market.
She revealed that Kenya has leveraged on private sector innovations and attained accelerated and improved health outcomes through the Managed Equipment Service program, where specialised medical equipment has been outsourced from private providers, leading to equitable access of specialised services such as dialysis and intensive care unit at the local government level.
Other PPP interventions that are helping to improve access and enable realization of our Universal Health Care agenda include the m-Tiba – is a mobile health wallet that was created through a partnership with Safaricom, CarePay and PharmAccess that allows people to save, send money and spend on health care.
Telehealth clinics have also been launched with support from Merck, allowing patients in remote areas to interact with specialists in Kenyatta Hospital through IP and video conferencing.
“Great Opportunities exist for the Private Sector. The Healthcare market in Africa was worth $ 35 billion in 2016 and is set to grow to $ 65 billion by 2022. Kenya, and many other African countries are open to private sector investment in healthcare,” she observed.
She called on Philanthropies for health to work with governments in the continent to address the most urgent needs of recipient countries, influence market dynamics to enable more affordable medicines and diagnostics and ensure accelerated achievement of SDGs,
“Philanthropic partners can align their resources to countries’ strategic plans and implementation frameworks and ensure that the impact of their investments is well documented and shared,” she advised.
