Palliative and end-of-life care in COVID-19 management in sub-Saharan Africa: a matter of concern.

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic has strained health care systems beyond capacity resulting in many people not having access to life-sustaining measures even in well-resourced countries. Palliative and end-of-life care are therefore essential to alleviate suffering and ensure a continuum of care for patients unlikely to survive. This is challenging in sub-Saharan Africa where lack of trained teams on basic palliative care and reduced access to opioids limit implementation of palliative and end-of-life care. At the same time, health care providers have to cope with local cultural conceptions of death and absence of advance care directives.