There are health workers in Africa who are not medically trained but who really know how to reach their peers in their communities and how to deploy health services. Unfortunately their payments are not stable. In fact, according to a 2020 study from the Center for Global Development, only 14% of Africa's 916,000 active community health workers are salaried, while the remaining CHWs are volunteers with some or no compensation.
They are doing such important work in the pandemic. They reach out to older people and bring them to vaccination centers. They deploy rapid antigen tests and get people tested in communities. And they do other work on diseases such as HIV, TB and malaria.
