Rédaction Africa Links 24 with AHIT
Published on 2024-01-29 12:07:24
The African Development Bank Group has partnered with the HealthTech Hub Africa to create a pan-African blueprint aimed at accelerating health tech innovations across the continent. This collaboration seeks to address the increasing demand from African governments for solutions to improve national health infrastructure and provide affordable health services to marginalized communities.
The HealthTech Hub Africa, founded by the Novartis Foundation and partners, is a pan-African health tech accelerator with a physical co-working and community space in Kigali, Rwanda. Dr. Ann Aerts, Head of the Novartis Foundation, emphasized the importance of fostering an environment for knowledge exchange, collaboration, and growth to empower health tech innovators and startups.
The partnership will focus on accelerating the scale-up of patient-centric telemedicine and teleconsultation services, improved data sharing, patient record tracking software, and artificial intelligence-powered diagnostic and screening tools within Africa’s healthcare systems. Dr. Babatunde Omilola, African Development Bank Division Manager responsible for implementing the Bank’s Strategy for Quality Health Infrastructure in Africa, highlighted that the collaboration will develop actionable recommendations to address capacity gaps for health technology innovations in Africa.
The HealthTech Hub Africa has already supported sixty-eight organizations across 17 African countries, addressing critical issues such as cardiovascular disease, breast cancer, and digital systems to strengthen healthcare delivery. In the past 1.5 years, two cohorts of innovators have impacted approximately 2.35 million beneficiaries, raised over $18 million in funding, and created more than 830 new jobs.
The announcement of the agreement between the African Development Bank Group and the HealthTech Hub Africa took place during the HealthTech Africa Investor Summit on October 16, 2023.
Overall, this partnership aims to promote the growth of the health tech sector in Africa and improve the delivery of healthcare services, ultimately leading to better patient outcomes and increased access to affordable healthcare.
