Non-communicable diseases: Laws, legislation, and reforms as pathways towards managing non-communicable diseases in Africa

Tosin Tunrayo Olonisakin and Ushotanefe Useh

World Development, 2025, vol. 191, issue C

Abstract: The United Nations’ sustainable development agenda was initiated to encourage proactive efforts in sustainable living. Since its inception, several other initiatives have been introduced to ensure the realization of these goals. Many of these initiatives recommend a context-specific approach that includes national legislation for sustainable living. Africa lags in the realization of these goals, particularly in the areas of gender equality and good health and wellbeing. This article is a perspective discourse that adopts an analytical method to emphasize and support the link between societal culture and health. It addresses African laws and cultural practices that promote discrimination against girls and women, increasing their susceptibility to Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs). The focus is on African laws and cultural practices in South Africa and Nigeria. The duplicity and contradictions between state laws and customary laws in these countries are discussed, highlighting how they appear to condone the violation of girls’ and women’s rights and put them at risk of NCDs. The article concludes by recommending legislations and reviews of African countries national laws and cultural practices and as means of reducing the higher rates of NCDs among women. African governments must ensure their commitment to the protection of human rights and eradicate cultural practices and modify laws that could increase susceptibility to the development of NCDs among girls and women.

Keywords: Africa; Cultural practices; National laws; Gendered health disparity; Nigeria; South Africa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X25000774
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:191:y:2025:i:c:s0305750x25000774

DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2025.106992

Access Statistics for this article

World Development is currently edited by O. T. Coomes

More articles in World Development from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().