 You also called on doctors, so here is one, our third panelist, Dr. Juliette Toakli, Medical Director, Chief Executive Officer of Family, Child and Associates, and Chair of the Board of Trustees of United Way Worldwide. Juliette, thank you. It's a pleasure having you on the panel. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for inviting me. It's an honor to be here on such an important topic. Some of us have long awaited, if you will, the day when we will be speaking about public health as a strategic asset, health even, as a strategic asset, because it has been so evident to us, the costs of ill health to economies, but it has not been evident in terms of the governance systems that control the purse, if you will. Earlier, the point was made that Africa repeatedly stands the risk of being seen as a monolithic narrative. For those of us who read a lot, it's the equivalent of the danger of the single story that Chimamanda Diche has referred to when it does come to narratives out of Africa. You know, a continent that is ridden by communicable disease as well as non-communicable diseases, warfare, and failed weak health systems. I am not saying those aren't true, but I am saying that we have a young population in most parts of the continent. As you pointed out, the average age is under 18. They do tend to be educated, albeit not educated for the economies within which they live. And I think that one of the big lessons here was seeing how committed the youth got involved in some of the national directives that came down around lockdowns, social distancing, masking, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Because unlike in the West, as you know, most of our economy is in fact in the informal sector to which these youths and other population members partake. And so locking down the system, the economic system affected them in particular. And I think that one of the things that we saw here in Ghana was how the fishermen, the teachers, farmers, as well as politicians suddenly recognized one another as all being contributors to both the health of the nation and the economy of the nation. And that awareness was so critical and so important, because as has been mentioned by the previous speaker, it does determine health and the outcomes of health and population behaviors. I think one of the other lessons we learned here in Ghana, but I know it happened in other parts of the continent, was where governments had always shied away from being involved with the public with the private health system. They found themselves forced into partnerships, triangular partnerships, if you will, with both the public health sector and the private health sector. And whilst this might not seem like a big deal in some parts of the world on this continent, it was a big deal, because I think it has set the template for future work, especially in the preventive health arena. So we had the lesson of triangular partnerships. We had the lessons of south-south risk sharing. You had mentioned, Mr. Chairman, about the issue of regional governance. I think this has been very important on the continent for us. And I think has been fostered by the fact that we've had a very effective African CDC that has promoted and supported such local governance structures coming together regionally and supporting one another where it's been necessary. I think that regional risk and knowledge sharing was very much in play, and particularly around data collection. And I think this is why we've been able, most unusually, to have such good data available. But the point has been correctly made that we now have to know how to use this data in an effective manner, both on the local stage, the regional stage, the global stage. And as, you know, Thierry said, let's be frank here. Africa has once again become the nexus for a lot of geopolitical activities. So it's going to be extremely important that we within the countries look at how our data is both collected and used here on. I think that's one of the biggest lessons for the continent. And I think that there are many lessons to learn from prior presentations that have been made to give ideas and guidance as to what would be most effective for the continent. I think the important point that 90% of health occurs outside of clinics and hospitals that has been repeatedly stated by the prior speakers and I'm so glad to hear that because it is so true. And I think that the farmer, the whole farmer industry at one point had too much of an influence on health from their perspective and not from the recognition of health being a communal, a result of communal activities, communal social determinants. And I think, again, we now are back, if you will, we've righted that wrong to some extent, and are able to perhaps be a little bit more comprehensive in how we look at public health here on. I am also very pleased to hear the recognition that regulatory bodies do need to start coming together and in fact in Europe are coming together, but we also have to recognize that one of the lessons we learned in Africa was the contribution of agility, if you will. I think Africa really demonstrated an agile response and most countries that did well actually demonstrated that. When you look at a country like South Africa, the Republic of South Africa, they have sustained a third of all COVID cases as well as nearly 50% of all of the deaths. They have the strongest public health system on the continent. They have one of the highest GDPs on the continent. There are lessons to be learned there. I'm not going to say that I am here to teach those lessons, but I think we have to be open minded because some of those lessons are very important. And COVID will not be the end of RNA jumpovers, viral jumpovers from animals to humans. So we really need to take learning these lessons very seriously. I think that when we looked at how the African CDC behave, for example, we could see the difference between some of these older more established global leaders in their responses and their behaviors and the relative agility that we showed. And I think we have a lesson to teach others there. I think that it's very fortunate that the African Free Trade, African Continental Free Trade Agreement has been signed and located here in Ghana, I may say, because I think this serves as another reinforcement level for regional regulation, regional governance, which I think ultimately is going to be the most effective format in health for the continent. I think that we shouldn't overlook what was mentioned earlier, the fact that we've all learned that vaccines can be prepared and ready to go in less than a year. I mean, that has been an extraordinary lesson here. And again, I think that in partly results from pharma having to revisit its role in the whole notion of common good public health, public health as an asset versus commodity etc etc. But I want to just come back to the issue of the, I think it was Professor Alexandra that raised it, about he mentioned that the whole digital technology and how important that has been. It has been hugely, but not just from the perspective of physicians providing telemedicine and telehealth or even virtual education. But I think it has shown, as in other parts of the world, the digital divide that exists in Africa. We have a continent of hand held holders, but the reality is that the smartphones, the smartphones are located in less far fewer hands than one would think. And I think this is an area that we have to start really looking at both from the government level down that we have to expand our digital exposure, our technological exposure. It's critical. It's urgent. And I think that I was glad to hear Professor Alexandra alluded to that, but we've also found it useful for learning. There are lessons receiving education from lessons learned elsewhere in addition to providing virtual services to the populace. So that whole area of the digital divide was where we realized that there was some structural inequalities that needed to be addressed and addressed very quickly. And I'm quite sure the teleco's are probably paying attention to this and will probably look at this as well. So I don't want to beat a dead horse, but data, data, data, control of data, accumulation of accurate data, the use of the data in establishing and redefining how we intervene as physicians, as politicians, as community members is going to be so, so, so important. Yes, the influence of social networks is as prevalent on the continent as it is anywhere else in the world. And sometimes one regrets the fact that certain leaders have encouraged this mouth your sense, if you will, in the exposition of false data, because it is an area that we will need to have all hands on deck and there are many lessons to be learned there. I will stop otherwise I'll stand at risk of repeating things that have already been said but thank you very much. Thank you very, very much. And thank you for again stressing a number of very important points of course everything you said about data and importance of data for policy making and for taking the right action. I want to remark on the fact that despite South Africa having the strongest health systems, at least by the way we measure health system efficiency at this time, you know, didn't prevent the country from having a severe outbreak but that's true of course for the, for the global world the US and Europe that that thought by by the, you know, the ways we currently measure efficiency of a health systems that that that wasn't enough maybe something to which, on to one on which one could comment later. Thank you also for your very interesting point on how fishermen, you said teachers, people felt that they were contributing to building public health. This is exactly the point I was making in my introductory remark that to me public health is a public good or a collective good because it is the result of the social political forces that produce the health of a population.