Malawi's health care system feeling effects of DFID aid withdrawal

Jun 6 2011

Malawi's health care system is "facing major setbacks" after the U.K.'s Department for International Development (DFID) made its final aid disbursement to the country in March and decided not to renew a six-year spending commitment that ends this month, IRIN reports. DFID, which provided approximately $122 million to Malawi annually, was the country's largest donor.

With foreign aid covering about 90 percent of the cost of all medicines in Malawi, drug stock-outs are becoming more common and physicians are frustrated they are unable to prescribe medicines, leading to low morale, IRIN notes (6/3).