Samwel Gatimu

Health Economist | Global Health | @SweInstitute @AlumniSiank | @SI_NFGL | #HealthInequities #IncomeInequality

[MedicinesPatentPool @MedsPatentPool]

Today at #UNGA, MPP announced sublicence agreements with 11 manufacturers across 9 countries to develop generic versions of baloxavir, an influenza treatment, under our voluntary licence with Roche.
A concrete step to strengthen pandemic preparedness, diversify supply and support access in LMICs.
Read more: https://t.co/vMVItsPyEJ…
@Roche @SwissDevCoop @UNITAID @LaurusLabs @MSNLabs @Guilin__China @kimiafarmaind @hovid @Fidsoncares @qcil_uganda2

[Jozef Síkela @JozefSikela]

We cannot build resilient global health systems only after a crisis hits. We have to build them before it hits. Our Global Health Resilience Initiative is about that.

Today in New York, we announced three new investments that will strengthen global health.

[P4H Network @P4HNetwork]

(1/7) Five steps to designing a blended finance fund for health.
Part 1 of P4H's series on financing health systems in the age of the aid retreat.
AfDB-Gates Africa Medicines Facility, the Africa Health Sovereignty Fund, Brazil's debt-to-health swaps -blended finance is being scoped across global health.
@kchalkidou

[Africa CDC @AfricaCDC]

Joseph Rukelibuga reached a hospital in Kigali just minutes after having a stroke. But it took hours to confirm his diagnosis. By then, it was too late for thrombolysis.

His story shows that getting to a hospital quickly is only the first step. Patients also need quick assessment, diagnosis and treatment.

His experience highlights the need for:

✅ Clear stroke-care pathways
🚑 Better emergency transport
🏠 Better support from hospital to home

#NCDs #ReadytoCare

https://t.co/g9G8MwDbgz

[Amb. Macharia Kamau @AmbMKamau]

Sometimes you see an article in the newspaper that seems almost unbelievable. This is pretty significant. Malaria was such devastating killer when I was young and throughout my entire Unicef career. Some things deserve celebration and this story needs to be told.

[Zemedeneh Negatu @Zemedeneh]

3 CEOs vs. 22 CEOs. Same starting point in 2005. Opposite endings in 2026. One airline soared. The other collapsed.

South African Airways and Ethiopian Airlines are both state-owned flag carriers with comparable regional ambitions. But their trajectories between 2005 and 2026 could not have diverged more sharply.

Both operate in some of the most challenging aviation markets in the world. The variable that separates them most clearly is not capital, not market size, and not even initial fleet scale, it’s leadership quality and continuity, and whether leadership was allowed to execute a strategy long enough for it to succeed.

Ethiopian Airlines has had exactly 3 CEOs in 21 years. Each was an internal successor, promoted from within after years, sometimes decades — of institutional experience. Girma Wake led from 2004–2011 (now CEO of Uganda Airlines); Tewolde GebreMariam led from 2011–2022 (recently appointed CEO of Air India); and the current CEO, Mesfin Tasew, who joined the airline in 1984, has led it since 2022. That leadership quality, combined with a deep bench of supporting talent and tenure continuity, allowed the airline’s strategic visions, launched as “Vision 2010,” carried forward through “Vision 2025,” and now “Vision 2035” and beyond, to be executed, refined, and sustained successfully across three CEO transitions.

The results: fleet grew from 14 to 170 aircraft, destinations from 58 to 161, and revenue from roughly $300M to $9.1B in FY2025/26, making Ethiopian Airlines the most profitable airline on the continent, and one of the largest in the world by several measures.

South African Airways, by contrast, has cycled through roughly 22 CEOs over the same period (I have personally met 15 of them). In some years, multiple CEOs were appointed within a single 12-month stretch. As recently as this year, both the CEO and CFO departed amid a dispute with South Africa’s Auditor-General over the airline’s financial reporting. The airline’s fleet has shrunk from roughly 55 aircraft to 19, its destination network from over 40 to 17, and it has absorbed more than $8 billion in state bailouts since 2000 without achieving lasting financial sustainability.

A brief side note on Kenya Airways, which offers a useful middle case: roughly 5 CEOs since 2005, a decade of technical insolvency, and, as of this writing, still no permanent CEO named since 2025. Kenya Airways hasn’t experienced SAA-level chaos, but its leadership instability during 2014–2020 (three CEOs in five years) coincides almost exactly with its decline from a profitable, expanding carrier into a company still working to fully recover. There are now hopeful signs of a potential revival, with the government renewing its focus on repositioning KQ, including efforts to attract strategic international investors.

Conclusion: one pattern holds across all three airlines, leadership stability doesn’t guarantee success, but its absence makes sustained success very difficult.

Sources: Company financial reports, curated research with proprietary information, and publicly available data.

Nigeria Tanzania Rwanda Ghana

[EU in Tanzania @EUinTZ]

🇹🇿🇪🇺 Are you a Tanzanian who studied or took part in an academic programme in Europe?

🤝 Reconnect with fellow alumni, grow your network, discover opportunities, and stay updated on events.

📑 Join the Team Europe Alumni Network Tanzania today:

https://t.co/xHEbKoMiZw

[Mehari Gebreyohanns, MD, FAHA, FAAN @MehariG_MD]

Excited to share the just published event page for the upcoming African Stroke Organization Conference #ASOC2026. Please stay engaged and support 🙏🏾🙏🏾 https://t.co/J3jxbQfb8Z

[Senator Angus King @SenAngusKing]

Prevention measures like an $11 bath mat could save Americans tens of thousands of dollars.

If Medicare would send these out to every recipient in America, I’ll bet the investment would pay for itself in under a year.

[Rice360 @rice360glht]

Applications for our 2026-2027 Global Health Fellowship are officially open! We’re looking for passionate leaders ready to tackle the world’s most pressing health challenges.

Explore the program and start your journey here:https://t.co/950RteTCtl

[Dr Jean Kaseya @Dr_JeanKaseya]

Today in Nairobi, on the sidelines of the Africa Forward Summit 2026, I joined partners in announcing a US$180 million investment collaboration to expand local vaccine manufacturing capacity across Africa.

This milestone represents significant progress in advancing Africa’s Health Security and Sovereignty Agenda through strategic investments in local manufacturing, technology transfer, and production scale-up.

The investment signals growing confidence in Africa’s pharmaceutical manufacturing potential and reflects the strength of partnerships committed to building resilient regional health systems and sustainable health manufacturing ecosystems across the continent.

In a world of evolving and unpredictable health threats, local manufacturing capacity is not optional — it is essential.

I commend Biovac, Proparco, the European Investment Bank, IFC, @gavi, AVMA, development finance partners, and all stakeholders working together to advance this shared vision of a healthier, more self-reliant Africa.

#AfricaForwardSummit #AHSS #HealthSovereignty #LocalManufacturing

[Community Health Impact Coalition @join_chic]

Global health is at risk of repeating its pilot problem — this time with AI.

We've seen this pattern before: rapid experimentation, weak public ownership, limited integration, and eventually — tools that exist in parallel to the systems they were meant to strengthen.

At Skoll World Forum last month, CHIC convened a workshop where CHWs, governments, frontier AI labs, implementers, funders, and researchers to take stock of the rapidly evolving intersection of community health workers and AI.

Are we using AI to strengthen community health systems or layering new tools onto fragmented ones?

The consensus was clear. You can't AI your way out of a broken system.

If AI is going to support CHWs, it must be integrated into professional, supervised, government-connected health systems. That means CHWs helping shape the tools they use, governments stewarding AI as public infrastructure, and funders investing in long-term integration instead of endless pilots.

The next phase of AI in global health cannot just focus on innovation. It must focus on public system integration.

→ CHIC contributors recently co-authored a new Lancet Primary Care commentary on AI and community health exploring what it will take to move from disconnected AI pilots to integrated public systems:  https://t.co/nxaydAqz8F

[AFREhealth Official @afrehealthorg]

🌍 Calling all Nurses & Midwives across Africa!
Applications are NOW OPEN for the James Hakim Leadership Development Programme — Nursing Leadership Training
🏥💚Are you a Registered Nurse or Midwife with 5+ years experience?
This programme is designed to strengthen Your leadership, clinical excellence & professional impact across Africa's health systems.
🔗 Apply: https://t.co/sXfUjf5UJ3
📧 [email protected]
5 Modules | 10 Weeks | 100% Online
⚠️ Only shortlisted applicants will be contacted. No feedback by 10th June 2026 = unsuccessful application.
So don't wait — apply TODAY! 🚀
#AFREhealth #PEPFAR #HRSA #MidwiferyLeadership #AfricaHealth #NursingLeadership
📅 Deadline: 31st May 2026 🧵 👇
#AFREhealth #JHLDP #NursingLeadership

[Cuba @CubaNgondi]

Kenya’s #health budget is set to rise sharply this year, but the story behind the numbers is intriguing. I dug into the latest #budget books to briefly analyze sector allocations the against the background of a shifting health financing landscape. Here's what I found 👇

[Kenya Investment Authority (InvestKenya) @InvestKenya_]

Kenya isn’t just a destination, It’s an opportunity.

Watch the Why Kenya? video and discover why global investors are choosing Kenya as their gateway to Africa’s growth story.

#WhyKenya #InvestInKenya #KIICO2026

@USEmbassyKenya @UKinKenya @GermanyinKenya @EUinKenya @FranceinKenya @NetherlandsinKe @CanHCKenya @DenmarkinKenya @SwedeninKE @WorldBankKenya @IFC_org @IMFNews @AfDB_Group @EBRD @DFCgov @Proparco @BritishIntInv @InvestAfrica1 @DEGInvest @FMO_nl @UNCTAD @ITCnews @WTO @OECD @wef @StateHouseKenya @KeTreasury @MITIKenya @magicalkenya @MakeItKenya

[Prof. Grace Irimu @ProfIrimu]

A proud moment unveiling a Proudly Kenyan Newborn Phototherapy Machine 🇰🇪
Locally developed, efficient, easy use, available spare parts & costs 25% of imported devices.
Led by Prof. Eng George Kamucha (technical), Prof. Grace Irimu (clinical).
KEBS approved, clinical trials next.

[Dr Jean Kaseya @Dr_JeanKaseya]

Today, 21 April 2026, I had the great pleasure to welcome to @AfricaCDC my friend H.E. @JozefSikela, European Union Commissioner for International Partnerships.

His visit marks a new milestone in our strategic partnership between Africa and the European Union (@EUtoAU), as we signed a landmark MoU to strengthen health security for both Africans and Europeans—because in today’s world, our health security is shared.

I was honored to be joined by my sister H.E. @MekdesDaba, the Ethiopian Minister of Health and colleagues from the European Union Commission and Ambassadors accredited to Addis-Ababa.

Together, we are building a partnership of trust, impact, and shared prosperity.

-----

Aujourd’hui, 21 avril 2026, j’ai eu le grand plaisir d’accueillir à Africa CDC mon ami S.E. Jozef Síkela, Commissaire de l’Union européenne chargé des partenariats internationaux.

Sa visite marque une nouvelle étape dans notre partenariat stratégique entre l’Afrique et l’Union européenne, alors que nous avons signé un protocole d’accord historique visant à renforcer la sécurité sanitaire tant pour les Africains que pour les Européens — car dans le monde d’aujourd’hui, notre sécurité sanitaire est partagée.

J’ai eu l’honneur d’être accompagné de ma sœur S.E. Mekdes Daba, Ministre de la Santé de l’Éthiopie, ainsi que de collègues de la Commission européenne et d’Ambassadeurs accrédités à Addis-Abeba.

Ensemble, nous construisons un partenariat fondé sur la confiance, l’impact et une prospérité partagée.

[Swedish Ambassador to Kenya @SwedeninKE]

Had a productive meeting with H.E. Hon. @AdenDuale, CS for Health. We discussed Sweden and Kenya’s strong partnership in the health sector and explored new opportunities for collaboration, especially in advancing cancer treatment and digital health. Looking forward to the next steps together!

[Pesa Wall @PesaWall]

APIFA Biotech Ltd's proposal to develop a Biotech Life Science Park at Konza Technopolis through a PPP model has received the first approval and will proceed to feasibility study.