Zim Can Become Africa’s Medicine Hub — UN

President Mnangagwa meets UNAIDS executive director Winnie Byanyima at State House in Harare yesterday. — Picture: Kudakwashe Hunda.

Blessings Chidakwa-Herald Reporter

WITHOUT the heavy burden of illegal economic sanctions, Zimbabwe can become a medicine hub for Africa as it has a vibrant industrial base and requisite infrastructure, a senior United Nations official has said. The UN official, who is in the country for the 22nd International Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa (ICASA), noted that although the country remains under illegal economic sanctions, it has been able to make tremendous progress in the fight against HIV/AIDS, consequently achieving world-set goals way ahead of schedule. Speaking after paying a courtesy call on President Mnangagwa at State House in Harare yesterday, UNAIDS Executive Director, Ms Winnie Byanyima, said the country was strategically positioned to be Africa’s medical industrial base. “We (her and President Mnangagwa) spoke about the industrialisation and local production of medicines. Zimbabwe has a good industrial base to start manufacturing all the medicines we need on this continent,” she said. In 2020, when the world was under the strain of the Covid-19 pandemic, African countries came second in accessing the essential vaccines and Ms Byanyima said that should not happen in the future, especially if countries like Zimbabwe are equipped to be major players in the production of medicines. “When the next pandemic comes we do not want to be treated like we were treated during the Covid-19 era where the supply was small and Africa was put at the back of the queue. Even with our money we had no vaccines to buy, so we spoke about local production.” ReadMore