Facebook supports bid to “revamp healthcare system” in Africa
Popular social media platform, Facebook, has thrown its weight behind a bid to “catalyze the current healthcare system in Africa.”
I Care 4 Africa is an initiative propelled by Hack for Big Choices, a Silicon Valley based NGO and Impact Hub Accra, a Ghana based incubator.
The initiative, designed to empower entrepreneurs and medical professionals to use their first hand experience and talents to match business opportunities in the healthcare space in Africa, already has the backing of Facebook and Merck, a healthcare materials company. It is billed to be launched in March 2016.
According to a statement by the organisers, I Care 4 Africa is intended to harness resources from private companies, entrepreneurs and governments to “lay down the foundation for a continent-wide healthcare system”.
“Until now African healthcare has depended heavily on international aid organizations that are not unified in their approach to creating sustainable innovation that can solve healthcare problems,” Hack for Big Choices CEO, Aurora Christe said.
“I believe that local entrepreneurs, who until now have been left out of the equation, are the trigger that can leapfrog the system,” she added.
“We decided to organize this program because many of us forget that people are suffering everyday…People are dying from malnutrition, dying from drinking unclean water, dying of curable diseases, and dying because there are no doctors or hospital near to them,” Impact Hub Accra CEO, John Paul Parmigiani said.
“We staunchly reject the notion that there is nothing that can be done to solve these problems, and that people around the world don’t care to make a difference,” he added.
The organisers believe multi-stakeholders collaborations are needed to address such a complex challenge as healthcare in Africa.
“Over the coming months we will be scouting organizations, institutions, Universities, NGOs and private companies that can bring funding, knowledge, expertise and technologies that can add value to and catalyze the healthcare system in Africa,” the statement reads..
