Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Constitution guarantees the right to health and food safety and refers to the law to set the fundamental principles and rules for the organization of public health and food safety (article 47). Furthermore, under the Constitution the State is responsible for protecting the environment and population health (art. 53). There are also constitutional provisions protecting the health rights of given groups including the youth (art. 42) and prisoners (art. 128).

The Constitution refers to a health mandate for the legislative power as well as for the provinces. The mandate of the legislative entity for health is addressed under article 123 which provides that the law sets, among others, the general principles concerning health, the competencies and resources of local authorities, as well as the protection of vulnerable groups. The mandate for provinces is addressed under article 204 which identifies areas for which there is exclusive responsibility of the provinces. This includes for example the assignment of medical staff, the development of sanitation programmes and campaigns to combat endemic-epidemic diseases, the application and monitoring of national medical and pharmaceutical legislation and the organisation of curative medicine services, philanthropic and missionary services, medical laboratories and pharmaceutical services and, the organisation and promotion of primary health care (art. 204, para 18), the organisation of vaccination campaigns against enzootic diseases, the application of national veterinary legislation and, the organisation of primary health promotion (art. 208, para 22).

The main goal of the "Politique Nationale de la Santé" (2001) is to promote the health of the entire population by providing quality, comprehensive, integrated, and continuous healthcare services with community participation, within the broader context of combating poverty (page 8).

The Policy, based on a PHC approach, identifies six strategic axes: restructuring the health system (page 9), increasing resource availability (pages 9 -11), integrating disease control and health promotion (pages 11-16), strengthening support programs for health activities (pages 17-20), coordinating and promoting intersectoral collaboration and partnerships for health (page 20) and, promoting a healthy environment (page 21).

Legislative and regulatory actions are mostly covered under the first strategic axis (restructuring the health systems) and include enacting relevant laws, developing comprehensive frameworks such as a public health code, pharmaceutical legislation, a public hygiene code, regulations on cost recovery, a service management code, and the establishment of directives and standards. These measures aim to create an organized framework for the health sector, clarifying roles, hierarchical and collaborative relationships, and the scope of action for each health institution, body, or service (page 9). Some references to legislative actions are also found under other strategic axes including the regulation of the use of health revenues (page 9), the regulation of the establishment of private health facilities (page 10), the elaboration of an Environmental Code (health promotion, page 21). Lastly, under the section relating to "implementation modalities", reference is made to the revision and development of various legal texts including, regulation of traditional medicines in primary health care facilities, regulation of biomedical research, framework law on health (page 21).

No current national health development plan was located, the last available one covers the period 2019 to 2022.