The African health ministers had adopted the PEN-PLUS strategy against non-communicable diseases.
In Africa, the NCDs are mostly treated in the major cities.
This worsens health inequities, as it puts care out of reach for most rural, peri-urban and low-income patients.
To overcome this Africa has adopted a new strategy called PEN-PLUS.
The PEN-PLUS strategy is a Regional Strategy to address Severe NCDs at the First-Level Referral Health Facilities by increasing the access to the essential medicines, technologies, diagnostics and treatment.
This will bridge the access gap in treatment, as NCDs account for most of the out-of-pocket spending of patients in Africa.
The PEN-PLUS strategy has been successfully implemented and scaled up in Liberia, Malawi and Rwanda.