The Accra Reset initiative has announced the formation of an 18-member high-level panel charged with producing concrete proposals to fundamentally reform how the world governs global health, a direct challenge to a system critics say has long marginalised countries in the Global South.
The panel, established under an initiative championed by President John Dramani Mahama, is aimed at advancing African health and economic sovereignty, and was announced in a statement issued on April 3, 2026. It has been mandated to produce concrete, actionable proposals to restructure what it described as a global health order that has historically treated countries in the Global South as passive participants rather than active decision-makers.
The panel is led by a quartet of co-chairs: Peter Piot, former Executive Director of UNAIDS; El Hadj As Sy, Chair of the Kofi Annan Foundation; and the health ministers of Brazil and Indonesia, Nísia Trindade and Budi Gunadi Sadikin, representing a coalition of emerging economies with significant weight in global health policy.
Other members include leading figures in global health, finance, and policy from across Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America. Former UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé has been appointed Special Advisor and Envoy to the co-chairs, bringing decades of experience in global health systems.
Consultative Group and Institutional Engagement
The panel’s activities will be supported by a High-Level Consultative Group tasked with creating a structured channel for engagement with major institutions within the global health system, including the World Health Organization, the World Trade Organization, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, and the African Union Development Agency. Prominent global figures such as World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and World Trade Organization Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala are among those involved in the consultative group.
The panel is expected to begin work immediately, with its terms of reference to be refined in collaboration with international platforms including the World Health Assembly and the United Nations General Assembly.
Background
The Accra Reset grew out of the Africa Health Sovereignty Summit held in Accra on August 5, 2025, where African heads of state and global leaders endorsed the Accra Compact, declaring that the existing health governance architecture, built for a different era, no longer reflects the continent’s aspirations amid geopolitical tensions, climate shocks, and shrinking development aid.
The formation of the panel represents the initiative’s most institutionally concrete step yet, moving from summit declarations to a structured body with an explicit reform mandate and a timeline tied to major UN and World Health Assembly proceedings.
