Editorial: “African Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Public Healthcare”

Abstract

The United Nations Human Rights Commission and the World Health Organization (WHO) indicate that access to healthcare is increasingly being acknowledged as a human right. However, the global analysis of the health situation in most world regions, especially in Africa, show that many countries are still faced with challenges of inequity. In the context of this Special Issue on African Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Public Healthcare, health equity refers to the differences in the quality of health and health care across different populations, i.e. differences in the "presence of disease, health outcomes, or access to health care" across racial, ethnic, sexual orientation and socio-economic groups.