Uche Usim, Abuja
In what can be termed an audacious continental response to curb the COVID-19 pandemic, the Board of Governors of African Development Bank (AfDB) has approved $27.33 million in grants for the African Union.
The approval follows a meeting of the extended Bureau of the Conference of Heads of State and
Government with Africa’s private sector on 22 April 2020, chaired by H.E. Cyril Ramaphosa, President
of South Africa and Chairperson of the AU, at which the Bank’s President, Akinwumi Adesina, pledged strong support for the AU’s COVID-19 initiative.
The AU Bureau meeting called for contributions to the African Union’s COVID-19 Response Fund
established by the AU Commission chairperson, Mr. Moussa Faki Mahamat, in March 2020.
Speaking after the Board approval of this operation, President Adesina said: “The African Development
Bank will strongly support Africa to get through the COVID-19 pandemic and build back, strongly and
smartly. The Bank’s financial support to the Africa Centers for Disease Control, reaffirms our strong
commitment to regional efforts to tackle the pandemic being coordinated by the African Union. Africa
needs a well-financed Africa Centers for Disease Control, today and for the future.”
The Bank’s grant financing will support the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) in providing technical assistance and building capacity for 37 African Development Fund (ADF)
eligible countries, particularly the Transition States, to combat the COVID-19 pandemic and mitigate its
impact. The ADF is the Bank’s concessional window.
Sourced from the ADF’s Regional Operations/Regional Public Goods envelope and the Transition
Support Facility, these two grants will support the implementation of Africa CDC’s COVID-19
Pandemic Preparedness and Response Plan through strengthening surveillance at various points of
entry (air, sea, and land) in African countries; building sub-regional and national capacity for epidemiological
surveillance; and ensuring the availability of testing materials and personal protective equipment for
frontline workers deployed in hotspots. The operation will also facilitate collection of gender-
disaggregated data and adequate staffing for Africa CDC’s emergency operations center.
At the beginning of February 2020, only two reference laboratories—in Senegal and in South Africa—
could run tests for COVID-19 on the continent. The Africa CDC, working with governments, the World
Health Organization, and several development partners and public health institutes, have increased this
capacity to 44 countries currently. Despite this progress, Africa’s testing capacity remains low, with the
37 ADF-eligible countries accounting for only 40% of completed COVID-19 tests to date.