AFRICAN HEART NETWORK GATHERS AND GROWS IN KENYA
The African Heart Network held its 7th Annual General Meeting and Workshop on 12-15 May 2007 in Nairobi, Kenya.
The workshop was designed to build the capacity of the African Heart Network’s member organizations to fight cardiovascular disease. In particular, the workshop sought to provide them with tools and strategies to manage effective tobacco control campaigns and to engage children as advocates for heart health.
The part about tobacco control focused on exemplary work being carried out by the Nigerian Heart Foundation to encourage smoke-free laws. The part about children focused on engaging children and seeing them as future advocates. Ghana proposed involving children during World No Tobacco Day through different essay competitions and publishing booklets/pamphlets. South Africa currently runs a very successful children’s programme which to date has engaged with 1.7 million children teaching them “Heart Healthy Habits from a young age” and has now extended the programme to include growing “Heart Healthy Vegetable Gardens” to reinforce the ideas and provide food where it is needed most.
The World Heart Federation is an enthusiastic supporter of the African Heart Network. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a large and growing problem in Africa, as it is in the entirety of the economically developing world, where 80% of all the deaths related to it occur. Sub-Saharan Africa is the only region of the world where cardiovascular disease is not the leading cause of death – but only because certain infectious diseases are particularly rampant there, principally HIV/AIDS. Nevertheless, the burden of CVD is rapidly rising, as according to the World Health Report, CVD alone accounted for 9.2% of the total deaths in Africa in 2000 compared with 8.15% in 1990.
During the Annual General Meeting, the African Heart Network welcomed three new members: La Fondation Congolaise du Coeur (the Democratic Republic of Congo), the Rwanda Heart Foundation and the Ivory Coast Heart Foundation. That brought the total membership to 12. At its founding in 2001, the African Heart Network had only two members. As recently as 2003, it had only three.
“We’re extremely pleased by the tremendous growth,” said African Heart Network President Robert de Souza of South Africa. “Various countries presented their work. It was very exciting for the new and prospective members because they could see what current members are doing across the African continent.”
The current members are the, the Cameroon Heart Foundation, Un Coeur Pour La Vie (Congo Brazzaville), the Ghana Society for Hypertension and Cardiology, the Kenyan Heart National Foundation, the Heart Association of Mozambique, the Nigerian Heart Foundation, the Heart and Stroke Foundation South Africa, the Sudan Heart Institute and the Tunisian Heart Foundation.
Mr de Souza was re-elected to another two-year term as President. In addition, Kingsley Akinroye of the Nigerian Heart Foundation was re-elected to another two-year term as Vice president and Ahmed El Sayed of the Sudan Heart Institute was re-elected to another two-year term as Secretary/Treasurer. Habib Ghamra of the Tunisian Heart Foundation was elected to the African Heart Network’s Council.
The Annual General Meeting and workshop were held in conjunction with the 1st All Africa Conference on Heart Disease, Diabetes and Stroke. The next Annual General Meeting and workshop of the African Heart Network will be held in November 2008 in Maputo, Mozambique.
