Surgical leadership in Africa – challenges and opportunities

Surgical care has been described as one of the Cinderellas in the global health development agenda, taking a backseat to public health, child health, and infectious diseases. In the midst of such competing health-care needs, surgical care, often viewed by policy makers as luxurious and the preserve of the rich, gets relegated to the bottom of priority lists. In the meantime, infectious disease, malnutrition, and other ailments, viewed as largely affecting the poor and disadvantaged in society, get embedded in national health plans, receiving substantial funding and public health program development. It is often stated that the main reason for this sad state of affairs in surgical care is the lack of political will to improve matters in the health sector. Indeed, in 2001, the Commission on Macroeconomics and Health concluded that the lack of political will to sufficiently increase spending on health at the sub-national, national, and international levels was perhaps the most critical barrier to improving health in low-income countries. However, at the root of this lack of political will is a lack of political priority for surgical care.