Egypt’s Minister of Health Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar has reiterated Egypt’s steadfast support for African countries in addressing shared health challenges, calling for stronger continental preparedness and capacity to confront epidemics.
Addressing via videoconference a meeting of the African Ministerial High-Level Committee on Global Health Architecture Reform, Minister Abdel-Ghaffar conveyed Egypt’s solidarity with the governments and peoples of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda.
He praised frontline healthcare workers for their efforts to combat Ebola and other epidemics.
Africa CDC Director-General Jean Kasiya, African health ministers and representatives of international health organisations attended the meeting.
During the meeting, the minister stressed the need for Africa to move from reactive crisis assistance to sustained preparedness and capacity building.
He said pandemic responses constitute a test of global health infrastructure, with the strength of health systems measured by their ability to translate preparedness into rapid action and effective coordination that protects lives during crises.
Abdel-Ghaffar further reaffirmed Egypt’s full support for African-led clinical trials and scientific evidence generation, stressing the need to build clinical research capacities in advance.
On financing, he said pandemic preparedness requires sustainable and predictable funding mechanisms, calling for ongoing global health architecture reforms, including reviews of World Bank and multilateral development bank financing mechanisms, to strengthen Africa’s health security.
He also affirmed Egypt’s support for the unified African position and negotiating red lines adopted by the Ministerial Committee on pathogen access and benefit sharing.
He stressed that rapid sharing of epidemic genetic information must be matched by equitable African access to medical countermeasures, technology transfer and fair benefit-sharing, describing this as essential to equity and trust.
Abdel-Ghaffar concluded by calling for a resilient Africa capable of emerging from crises stronger, stressing that the continent should not merely participate in global health decisions but play a leading role in shaping the future of the global health system.
