To ensure health security in Africa and attainment of Agenda 2063 of the African Union, health research in Africa should be African priority based, and impact driven. The current paradigm of health research in Africa, a home to 20% of the World’s population with 25% of global burden of disease is donor-based addressing donor interest without necessarily impacting the affected population.

Africa CDC therefore has developed a health research prioritization framework aimed at guiding Member States in a methodological and multi-stakeholder definition of national health research priorities across Member States such that aggregating national health priorities will generate regional priorities, indispensable in defining the African Continental Health Research agenda.

To achieve this, Members States through Africa CDC support, with in-country stakeholders will set their respective national research priorities using the framework, an online tool and local national data.

As an integral part of the process Africa CDC selected an expert committee to help develop the strategic and operational plan in consultation with continental stakeholders. The expert committee includes our Associate Director, Dr Jackie Stewart, who has, to date, been selected to represent the committee at the workshops in The Gambia, Malawi, Uganda, Lesotho and South Africa. This process will be conducted and completed in all 55 Member States by March 2026.

Expected outcomes

• A comprehensive list of high, medium and low priority diseases/health conditions per thematic area that will constitute the national health research agenda of the Member State
• High level areas per priority disease/health condition that have major knowledge gaps to be addressed through research and development.