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Are vaccine manufacturing factories enough to guarantee access across Africa? Egypt is assembling different pieces of the entire supply chain, something other countries can learn from.
Treezer Michelle Atieno - Editor
Between 2021 and 2024, post-Covid, the biggest conversation in African healthcare was the need for vaccine manufacturing capacity. But what happens after the factories are built? Egypt's latest healthcare investments suggest the next phase of Africa's pharmaceutical rise may be about building markets, skills and procurement systems, not just production.
In April, Egypt launched the Vaccine City, a 115,000-square-metre biotechnology complex that integrates vaccine production, research, logistics and workforce development. The project includes six manufacturing facilities, advanced laboratories and a biotechnology academy to train pharma specialists.
Two months later, Egypt signed agreements with the Africa CDC to host the operational headquarters of the African Pooled Procurement Mechanism (APPM), becoming the first country to host the continent's platform for pooled purchasing of medicines and health products.
Our take: Africa's next pharmaceutical challenge is turning manufacturing capacity into reliable access across the continent…Read more (2 min)
The WHO and the African Medicines Agency have launched a deal to harmonise pharma markets regulation in Africa. Eduardo Carvalho, a Senior Pharma Executive with experience at GSK and Merck, says that Africa must still overcome deep structural barriers that have limited similar efforts for more than a decade.
He argues that achieving a truly harmonised medicines market will require countries to overcome uneven regulatory capacity, dependence on regulatory fees, concerns over national sovereignty, major gaps in technical regulatory infrastructure. He outlines how to overcome them and how a single pharma market should look like.
“The question is not whether harmonisation is necessary. It clearly is. The real question is whether Africa can overcome the structural barriers that have slowed similar initiatives for more than a decade,” says Mr Carvalho.
Read the full opinion…Read more (2 min)
The biggest public health conference in Africa is coming up on 23rd November 2026 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The 5th International Conference on Public Health in Africa will be co-hosted by the Africa CDC and the government of Ethiopia, with a focus on Africa's transition from donor-dependent health systems to self-reliant health systems.
There are 18 other healthcare conferences and forums across the continent through the end of November, to learn and network.
The conferences span public health, epidemiology, maternal and child health, emergency medicine, nutrition, health economics, policy, innovation, pharmaceuticals, bioethics and disease-specific forums.
Full list…Read more (2 min)
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Fidson Healthcare in Nigeria is the first recipient of $50 million under a pharma manufacturing support project by the European Investment Bank and the Bank of Industry
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Amref Health Africa says, “Diagnostics are the backbone of resilient health systems, yet up to 80% of people in many low- and middle-income countries still lack access to essential testing services. Investing in smarter, more integrated diagnostics systems in Africa may be one of the most cost-effective pathways to health security and Universal Health Coverage.”