5th Scientific Conference of the African Health Economics and Policy Association (AfHEA) opens in Accra

The 5th Scientific Conference of the African Health Economics and Policy Association (AfHEA), has been held in Accra.

The biennial conference, which was on the theme: “Securing Primary Health Care (PHC) For All: The Foundation for Making Progress On Universal Health Care (UHC) in Africa, attracted participants from the African continent and beyond.

The Vice President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, who was the special guest of honour, commended AfHEA for their support to governments in Africa. He said diseases and sickness do not know borders, politics or ethnicity, and urged health practitioners and key stakeholders to rally together to find solutions to health issues in Africa, especially as the African continent lagged behind in many health indicators.
Dr Bawumia announced that the government of Ghana would commence the use of drone technology for the delivery of essential medical supplies to health facilities in Ghana in April 2019. He pointed out that a drone delivery service is a cost-effective approach to providing quality health care to hard-to-reach communities.

The Minister for Health, Hon. Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, in his introductory speech, said the government of Ghana is committed to using scientific evidence that comes from health economics, health financing and health policy expertise and knowledge to refine its policy and make new appropriate decisions that provide value for money.
He referred to the National Health Insurance Scheme as an example of a system, which makes use of strategic purchasing evidence and approaches to make the scheme more sustainable.
He disclosed that the Ministry of Health itself employ such evidence daily, and has a national working group on cost-effectiveness analysis that is chaired by a staff of the Ministry with members from other agencies and bodies to help make a sound, evidence-based decisions.

The African Health Economics and Policy Association is a bilingual, non-political and non-profit-making association inaugurated in March 2009 with its headquarters in Accra.
The overall mission of AfHEA is to contribute to the promotion and strengthening of the use of health economics and health policy analysis to achieve equitable and efficient health systems and improved health outcomes in Africa, especially for the most vulnerable populations.