Africa

When it comes to healthcare, the African Region is in dire need of additional resources, funding, and medical professionals. Healthcare expenditures are among the lowest in the world, with averages reported below $100 USD per capita in 2012. African countries including Egypt, Ghana, Ethiopia, Benin, Kenya, Libya, Chad, Algeria, Central African Republic, and the Republic of the Congo all spend less than 5% of the national GDP on healthcare costs. As a result, healthcare professionals are scant, quality of care is inadequate, resources are scarce, and preventable diseases occur at high rates. While Africa’s more wealthy nations, such as South Africa, are exceptions, in general averages on these measures indicate shortfalls. For instance, the average number of physicians per person across the African Region is 1:3,846. The average concentration of doctors per person is approximately ten times higher in Europe, where the ratio is 1:303. Nurses and midwives are just as scarce.

When it comes to life expectancy, there is diversity across the continent. African nations account for nineteen out of the twenty countries in the world with the lowest life expectancies, where some averages are under 50 years. With that said, some countries in Africa have relatively high life expectancies, for instance in Algeria the life expectancy is 76.39 years. It is expected that life expectancies will rise drastically across the continent in the coming years, through the use of new technologies to treat diseases such as HIV/AIDS.