H.E. Amma A. Twum-Amoah

Commissioner for Health, Humanitarian Affairs and Social Development,

African Union Commission

Excellencies,

Distinguished Guests,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is an honour to join you for this important roundtable on Building Shared Health Security: An Investment Agenda for Africa and Europe.

This conversation comes at a defining moment.

Across the world, health systems are being tested by pandemics, climate-related shocks, antimicrobial resistance, conflict, displacement, widening inequalities and constrained financing. These challenges remind us of one simple truth: health security is no longer a national issue. It is regional. It is continental. It is global.

For Africa and Europe, this truth is especially clear. Our continents are connected by geography, trade, travel, migration, climate, history and shared human destiny. A health threat that begins in one part of the world can cross borders within hours. A supply chain disruption in one region can delay lifesaving products in another. A weak surveillance system anywhere can become a vulnerability everywhere.

The lesson is therefore clear: no continent can be truly secure if another remains exposed.

That is why shared health security must not be treated as charity. It must be understood for what it is: a strategic investment in our common future.

Guided by Agenda 2063 — The Africa We Want — and anchored in the African Union’s health priorities, Africa has made a deliberate choice. We are building health systems that serve African people, respond to African realities, and are strengthened by African institutions, African financing and African leadership.

This is not rhetoric. It is already happening.

Africa CDC has grown from a young institution into a respected continental public health agency, supporting Member States in surveillance, emergency preparedness, outbreak response, laboratory systems, workforce development and regional coordination.

The African Medicines Agency is now operational, providing a critical platform to strengthen and harmonise regulation of medical products, improve access to safe and quality-assured medicines, and support the growth of Africa’s pharmaceutical and health products ecosystem.

The Africa Leadership Meeting (ALM) on Investing in Health (ALM) has helped elevate domestic health financing, accountability and universal health coverage as political priorities at the highest levels.

Africa has also set a bold continental ambition: to progressively increase local manufacturing capacity and meet at least 60 per cent of the continent’s health product needs through local production by 2040.

This is not only a manufacturing target. It is a health security target. It is an economic transformation target. It is a sovereignty target.

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the cost of overdependence. Africa imported most of its vaccines and essential health products, while global competition and export restrictions delayed access when lives were at stake. Europe, too, experienced the consequences of fragile supply chains.

The conclusion is unavoidable: dependency is expensive. Preparedness is cheaper. Resilience saves lives.

Africa CDC’s African Pooled Procurement Mechanism is therefore a major structural step. By consolidating demand, improving market predictability, strengthening procurement coordination and supporting local manufacturing, it can help move Africa from fragmented purchasing to strategic continental buying power.

This matters greatly for vaccines, diagnostics, medicines and essential commodities, including reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health products. It also matters for women and girls, whose health outcomes are often the first to suffer when systems are weak and supply chains fail.

Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

The case for shared investment between Africa and Europe rests on three mutually reinforcing pillars.

First, we must invest in resilient primary health care systems and the health workforce.

Strong health security begins long before an emergency is declared. It begins in communities, clinics, laboratories, pharmacies and district health systems. It begins with the nurse who detects an unusual fever, the community health worker who earns public trust, the laboratory technician who confirms a diagnosis, and the public health officer who alerts the system before an outbreak spreads.

Africa cannot build health security without investing in its health workforce. This requires stronger national human resource frameworks, increased training, improved recruitment, fair deployment, better retention, decent working conditions and clear pathways for career development.

It also requires addressing health worker mobility and migration in a balanced manner. Migration should not weaken already fragile systems. It should be governed through fair partnerships, ethical recruitment, skills development, circular mobility and mutual benefit.

A health system is only as strong as the people who hold it together. If we want resilient systems, we must invest in the people who make resilience possible.

Second, we must invest in equitable manufacturing, access and supply chains.

Health security cannot depend on goodwill in times of crisis. It must be built into systems before crisis arrives.

Africa and Europe should work together to strengthen regional manufacturing capacity, support technology transfer, harmonise regulatory standards, improve quality assurance, and create predictable demand for African manufacturers.

This is not about Africa replacing global cooperation with isolation. It is about building a more balanced and reliable global health architecture.

When Africa manufactures more of what it needs, the world becomes safer. Supply chains become shorter. Response times improve. Markets become more stable. Communities gain faster access to essential health products.

Local manufacturing is therefore not a narrow industrial agenda. It is a public health agenda. It is a jobs agenda. It is a trade agenda. It is a security agenda.

Third, we must invest in data, surveillance and community trust.

In public health, speed matters. But speed depends on information. Early warning systems only work when data is timely, reliable, interoperable and trusted.

Africa and Europe should deepen cooperation on disease surveillance, genomic sequencing, digital health platforms, climate-health intelligence, research networks and cross-border information sharing.

But technology alone is not enough. Data must be accompanied by trust.

During health emergencies, misinformation can spread faster than disease. Communities will not follow guidance from systems they do not trust. That is why investment in health literacy, risk communication, community engagement and local leadership is essential.

Community health workers in Africa and primary care teams in Europe are not peripheral actors. They are the bridge between institutions and people. They translate science into trust, and trust into action.

 

Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Shared health security is strategic for both continents.

For Africa, it strengthens health systems, creates jobs, supports local industry, builds scientific capacity and increases resilience against disease, climate and economic shocks.

For Europe, it reduces the risk of imported outbreaks, protects trade and travel, supports stability, and strengthens partnerships with a continent that is central to the future of global health.

For both continents, it makes economic sense. The cost of preparedness is far lower than the cost of panic. The cost of prevention is far lower than the cost of emergency response. The cost of investing now is far lower than the cost of rebuilding after the next crisis.

But beyond economics, there is a deeper principle at stake.

Health security is about dignity. It is about whether a mother can access safe care during childbirth. Whether a child receives a vaccine on time. Whether a young person living with HIV can continue treatment without interruption. Whether communities in fragile settings can be protected before disease, hunger and displacement converge into catastrophe.

This is why our investment agenda must be people-centred. It must place equity at the heart of preparedness. It must recognise that the most vulnerable are often the first to be affected and the last to be reached.

Africa and Europe do not face separate health futures. We face a shared future — and we must build the systems to protect it together.

The African Union stands ready to deepen cooperation with Europe around a practical investment agenda focused on resilient health systems, sustainable financing, local manufacturing, regulatory strengthening, health workforce development, surveillance, research, innovation and community trust.

We must move from declarations to delivery. From emergency response to long-term readiness. From fragmented projects to coordinated investment. From dependency to partnership. From vulnerability to resilience.

Excellencies,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Let me conclude with this reflection.

The next health crisis will not wait for our systems to be ready. It will not wait for budgets to be approved, factories to be built, regulators to be strengthened, or health workers to be trained.

That work must begin before the crisis comes.

Shared health security will not be built by emergency funds alone. It will be built by sustained investment in the institutions, systems and people who protect us every day.

Africa is not asking Europe to invest in Africa’s health security as an act of generosity. We are inviting Europe to invest with Africa in a safer, healthier and more stable future for both continents.

Because when Africa is healthier, Europe is safer.

When Europe and Africa prepare together, the world is stronger.

And when we invest in health security today, we protect generation tomorrow.

The choice before us is clear.

Shared health security is not aid. It is not a slogan. It is not an option for the future.

It is a strategy.

It is solidarity in action.

And it is one of the smartest investments Africa and Europe can make together.

On behalf of the African Union Commission, I thank you.