アフリカにおけるがんの負担（ルワンダ，日本，AU共催）別所大使冒頭挨拶
令和元年10月30日
(Check Against Delivery)
Colleagues,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
At the outset, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to H.E. Mrs. Valentine Rugwabiza, Permanent Representative of the Republic of Rwanda, H.E. Ms. Fatima Mohammed, Permanent Observer of the African Union, H.E. Mr. Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, President of the the General Assembly, and the American Cancer Society for making this event possible.
Today’s theme “THE CANCER BURDEN: AFRICA”, is very timely, as comes shortly after the UN Member States unanimously adopted the Political Declaration on Universal Health Coverage, or UHC, at the UN General Assembly just last month. As the Chair of the Group of Friends of UHC and Global Health, I worked together with Ambassador Rugwabiza and under the leadership of the President of the General Assembly to help make this document as impactful and relevant as possible.
The Political Declaration on UHC includes bold commitments to cover all people with quality essential health services, and to eliminate impoverishment due to health-related expenses by the year 2030. To achieve these goals, leaders promised to renew commitments to tackle not only communicable diseases, but also non-communicable diseases including cancer, which accounts for over 70% of all global deaths between the ages of 30 to 69, the most productive years.
Cancer resonates with Japan as it has been our No. 1 cause of death for almost four decades. Cancer also causes 534,000 deaths in Sub-Saharan Africa per year, in addition to the challenges of communicable diseases. And yet, it has not been payed enough attention it deserves.
As a long standing partner of Africa, Japan has long been collaborating with African people in the area of health. Japan convened the 7th Tokyo International Conference on African Development or TICAD 7, this August in Yokohama, Japan, which was attended by more than 10,000 people, including 42 African leaders from 53 African countries. We agreed to continue to promote UHC building on the partnership called “UHC in Africa” launched at the last TICAD in 2016 in Kenya, as well as the recent AU decision to accelerate UHC under the AU presidency of Rwanda.
For our part, Japan will improve access to primary health care and expand health insurance to 3 million people; train 26,000 healthcare workers; and promote UHC in Africa, in line with the G20 Shared Understanding on the Importance of UHC Financing in Developing Countries agreed under our presidency of the G20 this year.
Let us work together to live up to the renewed commitment for health for all to leave no one behind. I am looking forward to the discussions.
I thank you.