Brazzaville – Africa faces a persistent scarcity of oral well being staff on account of underinvestment, leaving hundreds of thousands of individuals with out ample care and susceptible to preventable oral ailments, based on a World Well being Group (WHO) workforce truth sheet on oral well being launched in the present day.
The WHO truth sheet states that the area has been experiencing the best elevated variety of instances of oral ailments like dental caries, gum ailments, and tooth loss during the last three many years throughout all WHO areas. In 2021, round 42% of the inhabitants within the African area suffered from untreated oral ailments. That is compounded by a persistent scarcity of well being staff to handle ailments burden. For instance, between 2014 and 2019, the variety of dentists and the variety of oral well being staff, together with dentists, dental assistants/therapists and dental prosthetists per 10 000 inhabitants within the Area was one tenth and one sixth of the worldwide ratio, respectively.
In 2022, the area had solely about 57 000 oral well being professionals, representing a mere 1.11% of the full well being workforce within the area and a ratio of 0.37 professionals per 10,000 individuals. This determine falls far beneath the 1.33 oral well being staff per 10 000 (158 916 complete; 83 099 dentists and 75 817 dental assistants and therapists) wanted in 2022 to realize primary common well being protection targets.
This deficit exposes hundreds of thousands to preventable struggling and highlights a crucial breakdown in oral well being workforce. It additionally reveals the necessity for about 199 170 oral well being staff (1.37 per 10 000 inhabitants) together with 103 858 dentists and 95 312 dental well being assistants and therapists by 2030.
Oral well being stays a low precedence in lots of African international locations, resulting in insufficient monetary and technical funding. Furthermore, oral well being has traditionally been siloed and handled as separate from common well being and the broader well being care system. This may contribute to remoted oral well being administration approaches, separated workforce coaching, rising prices, and siloed care supply infrastructures. This silo method has led to competitors for already scarce human and monetary assets. Though there are over 4,000 well being coaching establishments within the Area, solely 84 dental schooling establishments have been recognized throughout 26 Member States.
The scarcity of expert oral well being workforce hampers progress in direction of reaching common well being protection. Solely 17% of the regional inhabitants have entry to important oral well being interventions as a part of the well being profit packages of the biggest authorities well being financing schemes. Progress in illness prevention can be sluggish, together with fluoride use and sugar discount efforts.
“Africa can’t afford to neglect oral well being. Neglect has extreme, lasting penalties for total well-being,” stated Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, Appearing WHO Regional Director for Africa. “It’s essential for international locations to do extra to extend well being workforce, entry to reasonably priced prevention and care companies and be certain that individuals are outfitted with the data and talent on selling oral well being.”
The WHO Africa regional oral heath workforce truth sheet will function a reference for policymakers and a variety of stakeholders. As well as, it guides the advocacy course of towards higher prioritization of oral well being within the area to deal with this alarming oral well being scenario.
It requires pressing motion to handle the oral well being workforce disaster, together with aligning nationwide oral well being and well being workforce methods with the WHO International oral well being technique, implementing needs-based planning for human assets for well being, particularly on the main care degree, enhancing information administration techniques, corresponding to Nationwide Well being Workforce Accounts to trace workforce numbers and tendencies, shifting from treatment-oriented oral well being care to built-in prevention and promotion approaches, notably on the group and first care ranges and implementing modern workforce fashions corresponding to task-sharing of oral well being companies with oral well being staff and non-oral well being staff, bettering coaching curricula, and growing retention and migration methods.
“This factsheet requires motion. Elevated funding and focused interventions are crucial to closing Africa’s oral well being workforce hole. We should prioritize oral well being as a elementary element of Common Well being Protection to enhance well being outcomes and scale back the illness burden throughout the area,” stated Dr Ihekweazu.
