P4H in the Anglophone Africa region is gaining greater visibility
Anglophone Africa community background
All countries and territories in Anglophone Africa region have a strong commitment to attaining universal health coverage (UHC) by 2030. The Global Network for Health financing and Social Health Protection (P4H) coordination team has strengthened the Anglophone Africa regional dynamic in 2022 and includes Mozambique (as the lone Portuguese speaking country currently hosting a P4H Country Focal Person [P4H-CFP]). This platform creates a space where our team will continue to discuss common policy issues and experiences, best practices and lessons learnt in social health protection (SHP) and health financing (HF) for universal health coverage (UHC) across countries in the region. In the P4H Steering Group, the Africa region is currently represented by Morocco, the African Development Bank, and AMREF that is UHC2030 & P4H Civil Society constituency representative.
Concrete P4H network actions in the region, past and current
The P4H collaborations in the Anglophone African region are some of the longest. One of the very first P4H-CFP was contracted via founding member GIZ (German Agency for International Cooperation) in Tanzania in 2011. Since then, the collaboration has continued, which shows in the wealth of materials available on the Tanzania country page of the digital platform. Zambia, Malawi, and Namibia also benefited from the presence of P4H-CFPs. Currently we have the pleasure of working with P4H-CFPs in Tanzania, Sierra Leone, Kenya, and Mozambique.
In December 2022 the P4H Coordination Desk (P4H-CD) organized the first online meeting of our Anglophone Africa colleagues (including Mozambique). It was attended by Kuki Tarimo (Tanzania) Nkechi Olalere (Sierra Leone) Shana Hoeler (Kenya), Cristina Manzanares (Mozambique) as well as Martina Mchenga and Christine Ortiz from the P4H-CD facilitating the meeting. We heard from our P4H-CFPs on their current work in-country. All are diligently facilitating dialogue and collaboration around the topics of SHP, HF and UHC. Exciting news out of each country (that the P4H-CFPs were closely involved with) include notably (among many other things):
- Contributing to the text of the Universal Health Insurance Act in Tanzania click here for article and the Zanzibar Health Services Fund Bill click here for bill.
- Facilitating a Debt2Health SWAP in Sierra Leone click here for blog.
- Helping with an institutional assessment for policy options to implement increased coverage by the National Health Insurance Fund in Kenya.
- Participating in broad collaboration through the Global Financing Facility platform in Mozambique and facilitating quarterly high-level meetings on health financing.
Responding to needs and opportunities as they arise
The P4H supports this regional community with commitments to effectively serve countries and respond to their needs and requests by using its technical and administrative capacities and experiences gained in promoting partnership engagements at global, regional, and country levels.
There are many ideas in the works to strengthen the Network’s collaborative activities in the region. The P4H regional Anglophone Africa group will continue to meet regularly to share updates and contribute to ideas for future collaborative activities to be proposed for the 2023-2024 period. These include potential for the region to host its first ever Leadership for UHC workshop (L4UHC) and webinar on social health protection.