AFD-Aga Khan Partnership for Improved Healthcare in East Africa

When actors work in teams, they can amplify the impact of their operations. That’s why the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) and AFD Group have built a strong relationship over the past fifteen years, notably in healthcare institutions across East Africa. 

“AFD Group has partnered with the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) to improve access to quality primary and specialized care,” says Agnès Soucat, head of AFD’s Health and Social Protection Division. “They have bolstered that partnership since 2020 to meet the needs exacerbated by the Covid-19 crisis.”

When the global pandemic struck Tanzania in March 2020, AKDN and AFD signed an agreement to establish a dedicated infectious disease unit at the Aga Khan Hospital, Dar es Salaam and the Aga Khan Primary Medical Centre, Mwanza. “The partnership between AFD and AKDN is based on a shared belief that every human being has the right to access quality health services that improve their lives and help them thrive,” says Dr. Gijs Walraven, Health Director at AKDN.

See also: In Beirut, Accessible Health Care for the Poorest 

The Aga Khan Health Network has developed gradually, along with the growth of the partnership. “Many of our health facilities in Kenya and Tanzania started as small clinics focused on maternal and child health,” says Dr. Walraven. “Today, AKDN, through the Aga Khan Health Services and the Aga Khan University, runs a fully integrated health ecosystem in both countries. It’s centered on four main hospitals, two in-patient medical centers, and almost 100 outreach health centers, collectively providing care to nearly 1.8 million people in the region.”

Large-scale projects in Kenya and Tanzania 

The AKDN-AFD partnership has also made it possible to implement flagship projects in Kenya.

For example, the partnership has: 

• Made the Kisumu and Mombasa hospitals into referral facilities serving the local population
• Established the world-class Heart and Cancer Centre in Nairobi

In Tanzania, to meet its “immense needs,” AKDN and AFD have been working together to support an innovative anti-cancer project since 2019. The project “brings together public and private players and mobilizes expertise from Institut Curie to improve cancer screening and treatment,” says Agnès Soucat. AFD also provided a grant of €10 million in 2019 to develop the Tanzania Comprehensive Cancer Project (TCCP), a program co-funded with €3.3 million by AKDN. 

Through the TCCP project, the Ocean Road Cancer Institute (ORCI) of Dar es Salaam has been able to use a new ultrasound device to facilitate screening since February 2021. Meanwhile, the Bugando Medical Centre in Mwanza, on the shores of Lake Victoria in northern Tanzania, has just received mammography equipment to improve early detection of cancers in the Great Lakes region.

See the AKDN-AFD partnership in photos

Massive funding to fight serious diseases

“Our partnership with AFD has allowed us to focus on the region’s most critical health challenges,” says Dr. Walraven. Indeed, more than 40,000 cancer cases were diagnosed in Tanzania in 2020 according to WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer. In this country of 59.7 million people, nearly 27,000 cancer deaths were recorded in 2020. “The TCCP project will help in improving infrastructure, expanding access to screening and detection services, and establishing a joint research agenda across all levels of the local health sector.”

Over the past 15 years, AFD has provided total funding of more than $120 million to AKDN for the health sector in East Africa. Most recently, Aga Khan hospitals in East Africa were given a grant of €2.3 million from Proparco, AFD Group’s subsidiary dedicated to the private sector, as part of the “Health in Common” initiative. The grant will boost access to healthcare by benefiting the Aga Khan University Hospital, and Aga Khan hospitals in Mombasa, Kisumu, and Dar es Salaam, as well as 94 outreach and medical centers in Kenya and Tanzania.