[SciDev.Net] While declining global support puts African health research at risk, it is also an opportunity for Africa to take charge of its future.

Official Development Assistance for Africa has fallen by 70 per cent since 2021, putting increasing pressure on already fragile health systems across the continent.

This is a continent that carries a quarter of the world’s disease burden but contributes less than one per cent to global health expenditure.

As health research specialists, we are convinced that this financing challenge presents a unique opportunity to strengthen our health security, economic growth, and global standing by investing in our own health research, development and innovation (RD&I) resources.

This is Africa’s strongest opportunity to secure sustainable solutions to pandemic preparedness, accelerate progress toward universal health coverage, and guarantee access to quality, safe, efficacious and affordable medicines and vaccines.

With stronger health research, our countries and health systems will be considerably more resilient to external financial shocks.

We already have evidence demonstrating our health research strength from all corners of the continent.

Senegal’s Institut Pasteur of Dakar is scaling up vaccine manufacturing with government backing. South Africa’s Biovac and Afrigen are leading vaccine innovation and mRNA technology development and transfer.

Kenya’s BioVax Institute is positioning RD&I as a growth engine, and Côte d’Ivoire’s ratification of the African Medicines Agency Treaty, alongside the adoption of a Startup Act to support innovative new companies, clearly prioritises innovation.

These examples show how deliberate leadership anchors national ownership of the health RD&I agenda.

In August, health leaders met in Lusaka, Zambia, for the 75^th session of the WHO Regional Committee for Africa — one of the most influential global health gatherings on the continent.

Here, there were strong calls for reducing dependency on external financing and for positioning health as a pillar of regional trade and industrial growth.

These messages frame health research and development not just as a technical necessity but as an engine of economic growth, regional integration, and long-term health security, grounded in African leadership.

For too long, Africa’s research priorities have been shaped and oriented by external powers. The WHO regional meeting made it clear that the time has come for the continent to reclaim this space and set its own agenda for health innovation, building on the growing body of African-led research.

Africa is a wellspring of scientific and cultural assets and a source of knowledge generation that the world increasingly relies on. Large genomic studies drawn from Africa’s rich genetic diversity are unlocking fresh insights into diseases that shape global health innovation.

It also has a vast heritage of traditional medicine rooted in an unmatched ecological diversity that is now finding its way into the formal RD&I pipeline. The continent needs to harness its rich resources to drive groundbreaking health innovations for regional and global impact.

Africa is making significant strides in genomic surveillance and vaccine development, advancing scientific knowledge and the continent’s capacity to respond to health threats.

African-led genomic surveillance, led by organisations such as Senegal’s Institut Pasteur of Dakar, Nigeria’s African Centre of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases, South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases, and the National Institute of Biomedical Research in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has enabled real-time detection of new virus variants during outbreaks, shaping global public health responses and saving lives.

The current global health ecosystem benefits greatly from innovations led by African researchers, even though there exists a trust deficit towards locally developed products, negatively impacting uptake and market access.

The Institut Pasteur of Dakar has broken ground on a manufacturing complex with a capacity for 300 million doses of vaccine a year and South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare acquired the capacity to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines.

These examples demonstrate the world-class calibre of African-led science and its critical role in global health security. But to scale such efforts we need sustained political will and investment of public funds.

We must begin to see ourselves as the global contributors to science and innovation that we are, prioritising investment in our own capacity and infrastructure.

The key to unlocking Africa’s health RD&I potential starts by recognising the opportunities for collaboration and for high-return investments that power jobs, new industries and export earnings.

Governments must focus on local production and the homegrown research that underpins it.

We strongly encourage African health ministers and decision-makers to emphasise in their policies three urgent imperatives for Africa’s health sovereignty: first, to finance the African Vaccine Manufacturing Accelerator as the cornerstone of vaccine self-reliance; second, to accelerate the operationalisation of the African Medicines Agency as the mechanism to regulate drugs manufacturing and increase trust; and third, to ensure the African Continental Free Trade Area advances policies on intellectual property, digital trade, and investment incentives that unlock regional markets.

It is fundamental that African-led health RD&I is redefined as a driver of prosperity that will expand access to affordable, quality health products for all and strengthen the continent’s emergency preparedness.

Change must start now. We must turn our resource-rich continent into a knowledge-driven economic powerhouse underpinned by a robust health RD&I ecosystem that leverages our rich genetic diversity and drives groundbreaking global health innovations.

This article was written by representatives of the African Voices of Science: Ntobeko Ntusi, president and chief executive officer of the South African Medical Research Council; Glaudina Loots, director for health innovation, Department of Science and Innovation, South Africa; Johnpaul Omollo, policy and government affairs partner, Africa, at Roche; Moussa Sarr, principal investigator and head of business development and cooperation group at the Institute for Health Research, Epidemiological Surveillance and Training, Senegal.

The African Voices of Science is an initiative led by Speak Up Africa that aims to amplify African scientific leadership in health research and development by elevating African expertise in national, regional, and global R&D conversations. Speak Up Africa is an African-led, Senegal-based organisation dedicated to building an Africa where growth and sustainable development are driven by Africa’s citizens.

This piece was produced by SciDev.Net’s Sub-Saharan Africa English desk.