At the heart of Africa’s healthcare transformation, two prominent leaders are working hard to bring child survival to the forefront of the discussion.
Professor Muhammad Ali Pate, Nigeria’s Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, and Professor Samba Sow, Director-General of the Center for Vaccine Development in Mali, are Co-chairs of the Resiliency through Azithromycin for Children (REACH) Network and in that role, they champion a mission that is rooted both in personal experience and in a professional determination to bring about change.
In Health Policy Watch, an independent outlet for reporting on global health, the REACH Co-chairs make an impassioned plea for equity and access to life-saving healthcare interventions, rooting their arguments both in an appeal to our common humanity and in a pragmatic, reasoned, and realistic approach to sustainable development.
A personal mission
Professors Pate and Sow grew up in communities where access to basic healthcare was limited, witnessing firsthand the devastating impact of preventable illnesses on young lives. It is this understanding that fuels their commitment to REACH’s ultimate goal: to reduce child mortality through the biannual distribution of azithromycin to children aged 1-59 months in high-mortality settings.
And under their leadership, the REACH Network is going from strength to strength.
Major scale-up of the distribution of azithromycin to under-five populations in eligible areas is currently underway in Mali, Niger, and Nigeria. The REACH Network’s mission, meanwhile, enjoys strong support from national governments in the participating countries of Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone.
Professors Pate and Sow exemplify the ways in which personal passion, combined with strategic, joined-up, collaborative action, can drive real change, bringing us closer to a future where no African child is left behind.
Read the full article by Professors Pate and Sow on Health Policy Watch, here.
