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One of the major lessons of COVID-19 has been understanding that preparedness and readiness are crucial. During the pandemic, other countries have been able to step in and support as everybody faces the same battle.
Therefore, it is essential to ensure that the next time a need for crisis management comes around, countries are better prepared. This is where it is important to leverage on public-private partnerships (PPP).
The need for collaboration during the pandemic has uncovered the power of partnership that will change the demographics and life expectancy, according to Dr Amit Thakker, Chairman – Africa Healthcare Federation. Only those countries that have institutional partnerships were able to save more of their citizens through initiatives such as e-learning, supply chain navigation and telemedicine:
“We stand proud as a continent in front of the globe since we started early. We must learn and share with each in order to build a robust healthcare sector. Africans can learn from Africa, and this is the time for us to invest into a trusted partnership between the public and private sector.”
Hubert Danso, CEO and Chairperson – Africa Investor, highlights the lack of internal coordination regarding regulatory challenges and export restrictions among agencies during the pandemic as a supply chain issue. In some cases, this has been taking place within regions within a country and leads to confusion, added costs and delays.
He also draws attention to the lack of coordination between countries as another key issue, where some countries are following different approaches – some more stringent than others – creating substantial supply chain problems globally.
According to Rob Botha, Chief of Party: Global Health Supply Chain Technical Assistance (GH-SCTA) – Guidehouse, for any new medical device manufacturer or supplier emerging during the pandemic, understanding the regulatory environment in South Africa has “not been easy”.
He calls for harmonised standards and specifications across Africa, to begin to shape the market that will support local manufacturers. This will help ensure compliance in different African countries.
Ashraf Ismail, Marketing Director at mask-manufacturing Handel Street Automotive in South Africa, identifies not having medical device standards harmonised with global standards as a problem locally.
He also calls for harmonised standards, in line with the EU and US, and working with manufacturers to achieve compliance.
He believes this approach will help South Africa and the general economy of African countries, as well as foster innovation and collaboration.
Danso suggests that harmonising standards across the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will be a crucial first step in facilitating local production and trade across the healthcare industry.
This means deepening pan-African networks on both commercial and policy levels.
However, Danso adds, the AfCFTA is already prioritising regional harmonisation for 2021, as announced in September, and here it is the private sector that is behind the curve.
