Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevölkerung (DSW), WaterAid and the Slovenian Presidency of the Council of the EU are happy to host the high-level event ‘’A roadmap to a healthy and sustainable future – Health and water at the core of the EU-Africa partnership’’, which will take place on FRIDAY 9 JULY, at 14:00 CET.

The event discusses health for all as a priority of the new EU-Africa partnership, outlining the importance for the European Union and African Union to strengthen their cooperation in the area of health.

English/French live interpretation will be available during the event.

About the event

The 6th AU-EU Summit, which was postponed because of the COVID19 pandemic, will now likely take place in 2022, providing an opportunity for the EU and AU to renew their partnership and identify new cooperation ;

COVID19 shows that strong, inclusive, equitable and resilient health systems are a prerequisite for human, social and economic development. It has demonstrated that addressing health inequities and taking into account social determinants in accessing health is paramount to ensure health for all (nobody is safe until everyone is safe). Indeed, it is more urgent than ever to integrate water, sanitation and hygiene into longer-term health systems strengthening as a foundation for universal health coverage and global health ;

The COVID-19 pandemic revealed global gaps in health systems and basic services required for people to be able to protect themselves against the spread of the ;

Finally, the sanitary crisis also showed that global health research and innovation (R&I) plays a crucial role in preventing and responding to epidemics.  

If the future EU-Africa partnership aims at achieving sustainable development in both continents, a stronger cooperation in the health sector is of paramount importance. Such cooperation should have a rights-based approach at the core. It should aim at supporting the capacity of countries to strengthen health systems, by including communities, and investing in key sectors that are essential to achieving universal health coverage (UHC) such as primary health care, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) and sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), also in light of the consequences of the COVID19 ;

Additionally, the partnership should aim at scaling up global health R&I collaboration, which is critical to tackle the current pandemic, as well as the ongoing epidemics of poverty-related diseases like HIV&AIDs, tuberculosis and malaria, and the growing threat of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). 

In this framework, a new comprehensive EU - AU collaboration on global health issues in all aspects would be needed.

The high-level event will gather representatives from the EU and African institutions and from civil society organisations, to discuss how the future EU-Africa partnership can strengthen the collaboration between the two continents in the area of health.