From policy to practice: why the WHO’s Africa rehabilitation strategy 2025–2035 risks failure without educational reform

In July 2025, the WHO African Regional Committee adopted an ambitious strategy to address the 63% rehabilitation access gap through a comprehensive five-pillar framework. However, systematic educational exclusion of rehabilitation in African medical curricula may undermine implementation across all strategic pillars.

Analysis of the WHO AFRO 2025-2035 strategy implementation framework, complemented by systematic curriculum assessment across Central African medical schools and ethnographic observations from Cameroon documenting current access barriers and workforce knowledge gaps.