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COVID-19 has highlighted the need for long-term investments in regulatory systems to secure faster access to medical products. During a recent Livestream hosted by MSH and Deloitte, Professor Mojisola Christianah Adeyeye, Director General of Nigeria’s National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), emphasized the role regulatory agencies play in ensuring pharmaceutical system impact now and beyond the pandemic. One such breakthrough─local manufacturing─requires agencies shore up regulatory capacities and address challenges now. Prof. Adeyeye discusses how her agency supports the local manufacturing of medicines and prepares for the roll-out of vaccines against COVID-19.

In the midst of the global COVID-19 pandemic, it is hard to think of anything else. And yet, the burden of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) — such as diabetes and hypertension — remains and continues to grow across low- and middle-income countries. Each year, NCDs kill 41 million people, equivalent to 71% of all deaths globally.

In Kenya, over half a million adults were living with diabetes in 2019, and 40% of them were unaware of their condition. Nearly half of hospital admissions and an estimated 55% of deaths in Kenya are associated with an NCD.

Recently, a World Health Organization survey, completed by 155 countries in May 2020, confirmed serious disruptions in prevention and treatment services for NCDs due to the COVID-19 pandemic, noting that low-income countries are most affected. These trends raise great concern, as people living with an NCD are heavily represented among serious cases of the virus. 

In 2018, Madagascar enacted a new family planning law allowing youth to seek family planning services without parental consent. However, young couples still face major obstacles accessing these vital services due to a lack of availability, persistent cultural and religious beliefs, and minimal information about available options.

Training and empowering midwives to provide contraceptive services, particularly to Malagasy youth, is a key to overcoming these challenges. Here’s how the many midwives, supported by the USAID-funded ACCESS program, are playing this critical role.

Low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) struggle to reach and sustain universal health coverage (UHC) due to limited and inefficient allocation of resources. Their health systems are strained by a dual burden—continuing to manage infectious diseases, such as HIV, TB, and malaria, while responding to the prevalence growth of noncommunicable diseases, such as diabetes and cardiovascular conditions. COVID-19 is placing even more demands on already stretched resources. Systematic priority setting through the use of health technology assessment (HTA) is part of the policy ammunition at the disposal of those making such difficult distributional calls in these settings.