King’s Global Health Partnerships works with health facilities, academic institutions and governments to strengthen health systems and improve the quality of care in four countries: Somaliland, Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Zambia. We bring together expertise from King’s College London, King’s Health Partners’ NHS Trusts and our international partners to educate, train and support healthcare workers, strengthen healthcare and training institutions and enhance national health policies and systems.

We connect UK and African health professionals, providing training, mentoring and hands-on support; and undertake collaborative research to inform policy and practice. We also support our partners by providing access to funding, networks and development opportunities. Through these long-term partnerships and our global volunteering scheme we promote skills and knowledge exchange. This mutual learning contributes to building a stronger health workforce and improved quality of healthcare both internationally and in the UK.

King’s Global Health Partnerships: Covid-19 response

King’s Global Health Partnerships (KGHP) has actively supported African partners to respond to COVID-19. The pandemic has posed particular challenges for the continent, with limited supplies and medical equipment and weak capacity to provide critical care to the sickest of patients. The burden from Covid-19 has also had a negative impact on health seeking behaviour and the quality of care that people receive for other life-threatening illnesses - malaria, HIV and tuberculosis. 

There has been a concerning lack of data on the scale of transmission in Africa but we have seen the pandemic place a strain on already overstretched health facilities, health workers and medical infrastructure. KGHP has worked closely with long-term partners - hospitals and governments in Sierra Leone, Somaliland and DR Congo – to support their responses. We have done this by:

• Providing training and mentoring of frontline health workers to manage the most critically ill patients, increasing their chances of survival
• Providing advice and support to national governments as their strategies evolve
• Purchasing vital supplies such as personal protective equipment (PPE) for health workers and essential medicine for the most vulnerable patients 
• Working with local engineers to increase oxygen capacity to hospitals
• Deploying clinically trained volunteers when surge capacity is needed in government hospitals
• Keeping essential services running so that people with other life-threatening conditions continue to receive some care during the Covid-19 outbreak