Movement Health aims to transform Africa's healthcare for better lives
Find out more about Movement Health in Latin America…
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Regional Challenges And
Opportunities
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Equity and access
Currently, fair and equal access to healthcare is denied to over half of Africa's population. To address this, achieving universal health coverage (UHC) is essential.
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Disease prevention
By adopting broad prevention plans, African countries could better deal with the significant rise in noncommunicable diseases and the lack of health services targeting them.
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Health costs
Each year, millions of Africans pay exorbitant medical expenses that might be reduced with increased cooperation, digitization, and accuracy-driven efficiency.
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Collaboration
Greater collaboration between health stakeholders could help governments better implement the health innovation strategies needed to enhance patient care.
Our Story
Movement Health started its journey in Africa in 2022. Kicking off in Algeria and South Africa, each country began by recruiting local experts to expert panels where they reviewed local research, shared insights and decided where action, at the system and service levels respectively, will have the most impact.
Algeria
In Algeria, the expert panel has prioritized three areas of focus: digitisation, care provision and financing. In 2023, an innovation challenge was held to look for tested, scalable solutions in these areas. This led to Movement Health Partnering with Roche Algeria to Modernize Healthcare in this region.
Ghana
In Ghana, as a first step, the local expert panel is coming together to identify and prioritize the country’s greatest health system challenges. Movement Health is then collaborating with pharmacy regulators to solve the identified problems and challenges using the National e-Pharmacy Platform (NEPP).
South-Africa
In South Africa, the expert panel has decided to focus on women-centered care to reduce gender inequalities and improve health and well-being for women. The experts are placing a particular focus on cervical and breast cancer care. The solution comprises two main parts, which are: screening and awareness-raising, along with a mobile-friendly Progressive Web App.
Bulgaria
Bulgaria faces issues posed by outmoded norms, which persist despite efforts for digitization. Movement Health and Digital Health Village (DHV) have partnered in Bulgaria to introduce DHV’s “My Path” module, which provides patients with accurate treatment information. Long-term care and the screening and prevention of non-communicable diseases are the main topics of this module.
Chile
Waiting times in Chile increased by an astounding 365% during the COVID-19 pandemic, placing tremendous strain on the healthcare system and lowering the standard of patient care. Third-level care occupancy was made worse by fragmented decision-making across levels and the lack of consistent and standardized prioritization criteria. Waiting times were made even longer and care effectiveness was hampered by institutional absenteeism and operational inefficiency. With 3,969 new cases of lung cancer reported in 2020 alone, patients with this disease notably suffered the most from these lengthy waiting lists. Sensing the urgency, Movimiento Salud stressed that in order to improve the treatment decision-making processes, patient journeys must be accelerated, patient-hospital interfaces must be streamlined, and interactions between hospitals and healthcare providers must be optimized.
Colombia
Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death in Colombia. Three out of every 10 citizens also suffer from diabetes, while 1.6% of the population has been diagnosed with epilepsy. The challenge is to improve access to services, continuity of care, interconnection between healthcare providers and the collection of patient data, enabling the use of digital technologies and interoperability to increase citizen empowerment over its own health management. In 2021, Movement Health responded by launching a nationwide open innovation challenge that drew 47 digital health businesses. “Salud 360,” a digital solution designed to enhance prompt access to healthcare, was created by four carefully chosen collaborators and effectively deployed at Hospital de Baranoa, Atlantico, from July to November 2022.
Mexico
According to the 2020 census, 70.9% of Mexicans are covered by public healthcare, with 2.3% of the population insured through the private sector. This leaves 32 million Mexicans (26.5%) with no access to any form of healthcare, a situation exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. There is also a shortage of medical professionals, with just 1.95 doctors per 100,000 people. Infant mortality is the highest in the OECD, and the country also struggles with high rates of obesity (32.4%) and diabetes (15.9%). The solution came in the form of a Dynamic Digital Dashboard for Data Visualization to improve decision-making for preventive healthcare in Mexico.
Peru
In Peru, 64% of the population rely on public healthcare. However, there are many challenges when it comes to the efficiency of budget allocation and spending across governmental levels, along with a lack of human resources. This is especially acute at the regional level, which is responsible for 40% of public spending on health. This leads to inequities in access to and quality of care and, overall, lower healthcare coverage for the population. Optimizing health expenditure execution is crucial for improved healthcare access. With a meager 5.2% of GDP allocated to health, enhancing budget execution has become paramount. Anemia’s prevalence in over a million Peruvian children underscores the urgency of addressing healthcare challenges efficiently.
Africa
Regional Policy
Latin American health systems could provide even more accessible and impactful care if policy, investment and innovation could reinforce each other better. For example, health databases and applications could be connected to make patient journeys more like customer journeys: seamless, easy to follow and intuitive. This would ultimately improve patient outcomes. Movement Health 2030 aims to contribute to the creation of a long-term, strategic and holistic approach to transforming healthcare in Latin America, combining policy and innovation to ensure quality healthcare for generations to come.
Movement Health 2030 focuses on shifting policy in Latin America around three central topics:
1. Improving digital health infrastructures.
2. Increasing health and digital literacy among citizens and healthcare practitioners.
3. Making resource use as efficient as possible.
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Tõnu Esko
Vice Director of Development and head of Estonian Biobank Innovation Center at Institute of Genomics, University of Tartu
