Government Health Care Financing and Health Care Outcomes in Africa

Abstract

This paper uses the World Bank data on healthcare expenditures as a percentage of gross domestic product to analyze the funding available to the public health care sectors in 54 African countries. In the 2001 Abuja Declaration, these African countries vowed to allocate at least 15 percent of their annual budgets to improving their health care sectors and infrastructures. We developed the Compliance with Abuja Declaration Index (CAD Index) to gauge the extent to which African governments complied with the pledge. Our empirical results reveal that health care financing is grossly inadequate in Africa. The failure to finance the health care sectors at or above the 15 percent pledged in the 2001 Abuja Declaration has undoubtedly slowed Africa’s march towards providing improved health care for its citizens. Furthermore, African countries face acute shortages of medical doctors, nurses, and medical infrastructures to provide the robust health care sectors required for sustainable economic growth and development. African governments must implement policies to attract health care professionals by providing the necessary medical infrastructures.