Credit: Aga Khan University
Panelists at the Traditional Medicine event at WHS Meeting in Nairobi, Kenya, 29 April 2026
Leaders from government, academia, regulatory bodies and community innovation, and youth networks convened at the World Health Summit Regional Meeting in Nairobi on 29 April 2026, to advance the role of traditional medicine as a core pillar of primary healthcare and universal health coverage in Africa. The high-level session, “Traditional Medicine as Part of the Solution: Reimagining Primary Health Care and Universal Health Coverage in Africa,” was sponsored by the WHO Global Traditional Medicine Centre and its newest Collaborating Centre partner, Charité Competence Center for Traditional and Integrative Medicine (CCCTIM) at Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin.
The session emphasized the need to move decisively from policy discussions to field-level implementation aligned with the Global Traditional Medicine Strategy 2025–2034. High-level panelists from Kenya and South Africa, the African Medicines Agency, academia and community groups reflected on priorities for action.
Delivering a keynote address, Professor Martins Emeje, Director-General of Nigeria’s Natural Medicine Development Agency and co-chair of the newly formed WHO Strategic and Technical Advisory Group on Traditional, Complementary and Integrative Medicine, challenged stakeholders to rally together to prioritize implementation of shared goals and objectives.
He highlighted how the Global Traditional Medicine Strategy 2025–2034 can act as a practical “marking scheme” for the next decade, promoting focus on implementation and accountability for progress. Professor Emeje underscored that integration efforts will fail without the meaningful inclusion of Indigenous peoples and original tribal communities, stressing that solutions must be developed and implemented in local languages and reflect community realities, rather than being imposed through urban or externally designed models.
Panelists called on African leaders to move beyond symbolic endorsement of traditional medicine and instead demonstrate political commitment through budgeted and funded national workplans, embedding traditional medicine within formal government and business structures.
While reaffirming that the integration of traditional, complementary and integrative medicine into national health systems remains the ultimate goal, panelists highlighted the need for context-relevant evidence generation, robust regulation and collaboration, alongside the development of intellectual property rights and protocols that reflect Africa’s priorities and protect its knowledge systems.
The session reinforced growing continental momentum following SMART commitments made at the recent second WHO Global Summit on Traditional Medicine, and highlighted opportunities to strengthen regulation, research and collaboration through bodies such as the African Medicines Agency. Participants agreed that traditional medicine, when safely regulated, evidence-informed and community-led, offers a practical pathway to expand access, reduce financial barriers and strengthen resilient, culturally grounded health systems across Africa.
