Africa currently has the highest disease burden of any region of the world and the least resources in terms of health personnel and health systems. But things are changing rapidly, many countries are in the process of major epidemiologic transitions with falling childhood mortality and the prospects of controlling many of the traditional infectious causes of ill health. At the same time the combined effects of economic development and rapid demographic expansion against a background of increasing urbanisation will pose enormous new challenges for the health of African populations.

In this talk Kevin Marsh, Professor of Tropical Medicine at the University of Oxford, will examine the possible trends for the health of the continent.