Africa CDC Warns Health R&D Gap Could Cost Continent USD1.1 trillion

Africa’s continued dependence on imported medicines, diagnostics, and foreign-funded health research is becoming an economic liability that could cost the continent more than USD 1.1 trillion over the next two decades if investment stagnates, according to a new report by the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

Titled Investing in Health R&D: Africa’s Next Economic Growth Frontier, the report calls on African governments to meet the African Union’s long-standing target of allocating one percent of GDP to research and development (R&D). It argues that if 15 percent of that allocation is directed to health R&D, it could generate an additional USD 668 billion in cumulative GDP across the continent over 20 years.

The report further projects that such investment would break even within four years, ultimately yielding an estimated USD 137 in economic returns for every dollar spent over time.

Framing health R&D as economic infrastructure rather than a donor-dependent social expenditure, the Africa CDC compares its potential impact to the continent’s telecommunications expansion. It notes that Africa’s mobile and digital revolution now contributes more than USD 220 billion annually to GDP and supports millions of jobs.

“This positions health R&D as economic infrastructure, comparable in scale to Africa’s telecom and mobile revolution,” the report states.

It adds that African economies “cannot remain narrowly focused on raw materials and labor” and must transition toward “a knowledge-based economy” built on domestic research, innovation, and manufacturing capacity.

According to the report, Africa accounts for about 19 percent of the global population but only 1.1 percent of global R&D investment. Despite the African Union adopting the one percent target nearly two decades ago, average continental spending remains at 0.45 percent of GDP—well below the global average of 1.7 percent.

The AU’s target is presented as the central scenario in the report’s economic modeling, which evaluates five policy pathways for the continent’s R&D trajectory. Under this baseline transformation scenario, health R&D spending would rise to 0.15 percent of GDP by 2030, more than doubling current levels.

Researchers behind the report emphasize that the projected returns are not distant or theoretical. “The model shows that investment breaks even within four years,” it notes, adding that GDP growth could increase by approximately 0.4 percentage points above baseline by 2030 and approach one percentage point by 2035.

By 2044, full implementation of the AU target is projected to support 4.56 million jobs across African economies, spanning scientists, laboratory technicians, clinical trial coordinators, manufacturers, logistics personnel, and technology professionals embedded in the broader health innovation ecosystem.

Still, the report’s starkest warning is reserved for what it calls the “cost of inaction.” If health R&D spending falls 25 percent below the current baseline, the continent could forgo more than USD 1.1 trillion in GDP over 20 years. “The cost of standing still is not zero,” it cautions.

The Africa CDC argues that chronic underinvestment already carries tangible costs, including brain drain, widening trade imbalances, dependence on imported pharmaceuticals, and heightened vulnerability to global supply chain shocks.

The report repeatedly links weak R&D spending to Africa’s reliance on imported pharmaceuticals and medical technologies, noting that domestic manufacturing capacity remains limited despite growing demand across the continent.

One of the report’s central economic arguments is that sustained investment in health R&D would gradually reduce Africa’s dependence on pharmaceutical imports while laying the foundation for export-oriented industries.

“As domestic capacity builds, countries produce more of what they need and begin to export health technologies to regional markets,” the report states.

Its modeling projects a cumulative USD 14 billion improvement in Africa’s trade balance over the study period, driven by reduced health-related imports and increased exports.

The report cites Egypt as a case study in pharmaceutical self-sufficiency and domestically financed R&D. It identifies the country as the only African nation to have achieved the African Union’s target of allocating one percent of GDP to R&D primarily through state financing rather than donor support.

According to the report, Egypt now produces more than 94 percent of the medicines consumed domestically, while pharmaceutical imports declined by roughly USD 500 million year-on-year. Pharmaceutical exports surpassed USD one billion in 2023, with authorities targeting USD five billion by 2030.

Elsewhere, the report highlights South Africa’s mRNA technology transfer initiatives and Rwanda’s BioNTech vaccine manufacturing facility as examples of how local R&D ecosystems can attract foreign investment, generate skilled employment, and expand industrial capacity.

The report also pointed to the fragility of Africa’s reliance on foreign aid. It notes that official development assistance from donor countries within the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development declined by 23.1 percent in real terms in 2025, describing it as “the largest annual contraction ever recorded in the history of official development assistance.”

That decline, combined with supply chain disruptions exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic, is presented as evidence that Africa can no longer rely on external systems to guarantee health security.

“The COVID-19 pandemic revealed Africa’s dependence on global manufacturing and supply chains for key medicines and logistics, literally leaving the entire African population vulnerable,” the report states.

The document further argues that Africa’s current position in the global health economy remains disproportionately consumptive rather than productive. While the continent bears roughly 25 percent of the global disease burden, only four percent of clinical trials conducted worldwide in 2023 took place in African countries.

Researchers behind the report contend that countries investing heavily in R&D benefit not only from scientific breakthroughs, but also from the jobs, patents, manufacturing ecosystems, and private capital that follow public investment.

“Strikingly, 90 percent of the economic benefits of that investment — the skilled jobs, scientific capacity, and industrial growth — have remained in the countries that funded it,” the report notes, referring to global patterns in R&D investment.

المصدر: The Reporter (Ethiopia)