Africa Shifts from Training to Retention as Workforce Crisis Intensifies

African leaders have turned the spotlight on the growing loss of health professionals at the Second Africa Health Workforce Investment Forum in Accra, with a sharp focus on retaining talent rather than just training it.

Opening the meeting, the Vice President of the Republic of Ghana, Her Excellency Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang, raised concerns about the persistent gap between training and retention, urging stakeholders to identify and fix the systemic issues driving health workers away.

She stressed that strong health systems are central to economic growth and national stability, citing Ghana’s ongoing rollout of Free Primary Healthcare and the MahamaCares initiative, as well as plans to recruit about 16,000 health workers this year.

Health Minister Kwabena Mintah Akandoh described the forum as a decisive moment to turn commitments into results, noting that workforce investment must lead to real jobs, better distribution and improved working conditions.

He added that Ghana is developing a National Health Workforce Investment Plan to guide long-term staffing needs, while also rolling out reforms to improve deployment to underserved areas and align training with the country’s healthcare demands.

From a continental perspective, WHO Africa Regional Director Mohamed Yakub Janabi warned that Africa is losing a significant share of its trained professionals to other regions, despite increasing training capacity.

He called for fair international partnerships, where countries benefiting from African health workers contribute to training and retention efforts.

The Accra forum is expected to drive concrete actions to curb migration, strengthen health systems and ensure Africa’s investment in its workforce delivers results at home.

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