Africa is building drug factories; Now it needs enough buyers

The article highlights Africa’s reliance on imported medicines and the related effort to expand local manufacturing. It notes a key challenge faced by manufacturers, i.e. that plants require predictable volumes to operate and provide competitive pricing on their products.

Claudia Martínez, the Director of Research at the Foundation, is quoted on how the continent’s market fragmentation: “Getting a medicine approved country by country in Africa is, at times, slowing access.”

The article also mentions the changing disease burden across the continent, with rising rates of non-communicable diseases putting additional pressure on the effort to address access gaps.

The article ends on a quote from Claudia: “The most important challenge would be the missed opportunity of actually getting the medicines that patients need into their hands.”