Embracing change, moving with time: exploring the role of digital technologies and accelerators in promoting community oral health in Africa

Abstract

.The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aim to provide a framework for addressing global environmental, political and socio-economic challenges, with the third goal focusing on ensuring healthy lives and promoting wellbeing for all [1]. The third SDG emphasizes the need for achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC) while addressing health inequities, particularly among the most vulnerable populations [1]. It advocates for comprehensive access to various health services for all, including preventive, curative and rehabilitative services [1]. However, five years away from the realization of the 2030 agenda, significant health inequities still exist, especially in developing countries, where the healthcare burden is characterised by infectious diseases, complicated by climate change and antimicrobial resistance [2][3][4][5][6][7]. Furthermore, access to timely, adequate and quality healthcare in Africa remains a huge challenge [8].The health inequities have not spared oral healthcare. Nearly half (44%) of the populations are affected by oral diseases in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), yet investments in oral healthcare remain extremely low across the region [9]. As of 2019, it was estimated that more than 70% of SSA countries, spend only less than a dollar per individual on treatment of oral diseases [9,10]. This greatly undermines the quality, efficiency and effectiveness of oral healthcare services provided across the region. Underinvestment in healthcare greatly affects the marginalized, hard-to-reach rural communities where access to health services is usually already a big challenge [8].Achieving global and regional goals requires addressing the existing health disparities, while ensuring that people have access to all the health services they need. This calls for investment into innovative, and less costly tools that could aid in disease promotion, training, and treatment and potentially lead to massive health gains. Digital technologies offer greater prospects and have been greatly utilized in the modern world to improve livelihood outcomes including in healthcare [11][12][13][14][15]. Clear evidence exists that developmental accelerators such as digital technologies can bring about improved outcomes in health care and have greatly been utilized in multiple areas such as adolescent and sexual health, mental health, enhancing HIV prevention and treatment [11][12][13][14][15]. However, use of such technologies within the oral healthcare space has not been adequately explored.Therefore, the aim of this opinion article is to highlight how digital technologies and accelerators can be utilized to promote community oral health in Africa, thereby aiding in achieving sustainable development goals as well as Africa Agenda 2063.The burden of oral diseases still remains high in Africa causing a major health concern [16]. Dental carries, periodontal diseases, orofacial trauma, oral cancers, birth defects, HIV (Immunosuppression) associated oral diseases and Noma remain greatly common and affect more than 480 million (43.7%) people in Africa [16]. The spatial distributions of these oral diseases skews towards the vulnerable, marginalized and poverty-stricken individuals reflecting disparities in access to oral health care services across the continent [17]. The trends in the burden of oral diseases remain constant across life time, from childhood to older age, across countries with the poorer communities being greatly affected [17].In Africa, the growing burden of oral diseases has been attributed to the ever-growing population. SSA has an annual growth rate of 2.8% and the current population is expected to double between 2022 and 2050 [17,18]. Despite the growth in population, the state of healthcare largely remains the same with most countries battling the same challenges for several decades [8,[19][20][21] Furthermore, the high prevalence of HIV in SSA predisposes people to oral diseases associated with immunosuppression such as oral can