Higher Education Minister and acting Health Minister Khaled Abdel Ghaffar said Sunday the many challenges facing the African continent do influence health services offered to citizens.
Overpopulation, poverty, conflicts, lack of political stability and education are the main challenges facing the continent at the time being, said Abdel Ghaffar at the 1st Africa Health ExCon, the biggest medical exhibition and conference on the continent.
Those who believe that health services are limited to hospitals and health staff are mistaken because it is an integrated mechanism involving education, roads, investment and political and economic stability, he added.
He noted that 76 percent of Africans live under the poverty line, earning less than 2 dollars per day.
He added that 490 million Africans out of 300 billion are in acute poverty.
He warned that overpopulation is a main obstacle to development plans as well as poverty which is worse than any disease or virus.
Abdel Ghaffar said only two percent of drugs are produced in Africa while more than 98 percent are imported from abroad.
More than 400 members of the healthcare chamber are taking part in the event alongside a number of international and national companies operating in the medical sector, topped by the Egyptian Authority for Unified Procurement, Medical Supply and Technology Management (AUPP) and the Arab Hospitals Federation.
