Accra pushes a new international model for health : Shared by Tom McDermott

 

The 'Accra Reset': Time’s up for the legacy aid system

Sara Jerving // Devex // 01 October 2025
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Summary
Ghana’s President John Dramani Mahama, supported by African leaders and global partners, has launched the “Accra Reset,” a bold initiative to move beyond the legacy aid model toward health sovereignty and equitable global cooperation. First endorsed in August at the Africa Health Sovereignty Summit, the Reset has now expanded to include climate resilience, food security, and economic growth. Backed by over $1 billion in pledges from African development finance institutions and private banks, it aims to create new governance, financing, and business models rooted in national ownership.

The Reset proposes moving beyond global goal-setting (like the SDGs) toward practical business models and financing systems, including pooled pledges, strategic “deal rooms,” and the SUSTAIN initiative to strengthen health systems with domestic resources and private sector engagement. A new global presidential council and advisory panel will guide the effort. Leaders stress this is not a rejection of past aid gains but a necessary evolution for an era of global turbulence and aid dependency fatigue.

Quotes

• “We need to strategize. The world needs a reset, a re-engineering of the very logic of development itself.” — President John Dramani Mahama

• “From Accra, a message went out to the world: If we are to heal our health systems, we must first reset development itself.” — Mahama

• “How do we begin this shift away from the horrible word ‘aid’ to a partnership that we’ve been promising for 25 years? We have broken the promises we've made.” — Mark Dybul, former head of the Global Fund

• “We don't have to fight for resources. We can just be more creative with the resources and partnerships that we have.” — Ngozi Erondu, Global Institute for Disease Elimination