African leaders have been urged to invest heavily in technology for the healthcare systems of their respective countries to ensure that the continent overcomes its numerous critical healthcare challenges.
Mr Bosun Tijani, the Minister of Communication, Innovation, and Digital Economy of Nigeria, who made the call, said there was the need for the strengthening of healthcare systems with modern technology to solve Africa’s health needs.
Mr. Tijani said this at a breakfast meeting during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, organised by GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, and co-hosted by Zipline among others, on the theme: “Innovation at Scale: Ensuring Health and Prosperity.”
He said governments must be empowered to use available modern technologies to ensure health care information was accessible to the people.
Even though there might be numerous facilities, the lack of technological connections could hinder proper healthcare delivery, he said, and stressed the importance of creating ecosystems that could support and scale up innovations to address the healthcare challenges and other developmental issues.
Mr Tijani cited Rwanda as a good example of countries, which laid the foundation and provided an ecosystem to drive innovation, leading to the successful resolution of its challenges.
Technological investments like those made by Zipline served as catalysts for health advancement and development, he said, and called for investment in essential infrastructure to accelerate development.
He said Zipline’s recently introduced drone technology for the distribution of essential medical commodities, including vaccines and blood to several communities in Ghana and Nigeria within the shortest possible time.
That demonstrated that investing in modern technology could significantly improve the quality of health care for patients while making the work of health professionals easy and efficient in Africa.
