Breaking News - Cameroon’s Former Health Minister, Prof. Gottlieb Lobe Monekosso Dies

News of the demise of Cameroon’s former Minister of Public Health, Dr. Gottlieb Lobe Monekosso has created shockwave in the medical community, both within the country and in renowned international health circles abroad.

The Medical Professor passed away on Sunday, November 19, 2017, at the Douala General Hospital.

Described by his peers around the globe as ‘an encyclopaedia of health practice in Africa’, Dr. Monekosso has left an outstanding legacy which stands as a reference point for medical programmes and policies across Africa.

Breaking News - Cameroon’s Former Health Minister, Prof. Gottlieb Lobe Monekosso Dies

He was former Regional Director of the World Health Organisation, WHO, in Africa – a decade prior to his appointment as Minister in 1997, Prof. Monekosso has been credited for implementing the concept of “Health Districts” to bring health centres even much closer to remote and isolated locations in the continent.

Back in 2012, he was honoured in London with the Gold Medal for the Prestigious “Queen Elisabeth II” Competition, organised by the Royal Society of Public Health among professionals of the Common Wealth.

Adding to these international achievements, Dr. Monekosso also impacted his native Cameroon with an unparalleled set of health policies and activities which still benefit the average person in the country today.

He engineered for instance a project geared at enabling all Cameroonians, irrespective of their income, have access to medical treatment through a shared health risk scheme.

For the past five years, he has also been at the helm of Global Health Dialogue, a Douala-based NGO bordering on health issues.

Gottlieb Lobe Monekosso was born on November 13, 1928 in Cameroon. He did his medical training in Nigeria and the United Kingdom where he obtained a Doctor of Medicine (MD) in 1957.

As a shrewd health expert, who has devoted his entire life to medical research and public health issues in Africa, the international medical community, health practitioners and policy makers in Cameroon, as well as his colleagues, friends and family mourn the departure of such a great mind.