Health Sector Corruption and Access to Healthcare in Africa

Using Afrobarometer data, we show that respondents living in sub-national regions in which corruption in the health sector is more common are more likely to report that they have had to go without medical care for themselves or their family regularly or lack access entirely. We also show that corruption in other aspects of the public administration is not significantly associated with access to health care, suggesting that when it comes to improving access to healthcare, fighting medical corruption is of primary importance. For those who have accessed medical care, the regional incidence of medical corruption predicts more difficulty in terms of obtaining the care that they needed. We conclude that medical corruption not only restricts access to medical care, but also degrades the quality of the service for those able to access the system.