Ghana rejects $109 million US health compact proposal

President Mahama has announced that his Cabinet rejected a proposed US health compact valued at approximately $109 million over five years. Speaking at a Council on Foreign Relations event during UNGA 2026, the President described the terms of the agreement as “humiliating.”

According to the President, the proposal would have required Ghana to provide its pathogen profile and medical records, while simultaneously preventing the Ghana Food and Drugs Authority from inspecting imported medical products. Reported details of the agreement suggest a potential 25-year data term for a five-year program, and a structure where US funding would be subject to congressional approval while Ghana would face a binding commitment of roughly $70 million.

The US Embassy in Accra responded by stating that Washington had only requested aggregate data without personal identifiers, consistent with existing PEPFAR arrangements. The Embassy noted that the United States has invested $2.2 billion in Ghana’s health sector since 2012 and emphasized that the door remains open for future negotiations.