Research Question: What proportion of the Senegalese

population lives more than 25 kilometers from a health center?

Senegal is divided between the geographically small but highly populated coastal capital city of Dakar and parts of the somewhat sparsely populated Sa-hel desert. As a result, it is likely that access to public goods may differ for ur-ban and rural citizens. In particular, access to reliable healthcare has been a noteworthy issue in Senegal recently, in the context of the Ebola scare, and there is a highly uneven geographic distribution of health centers throughout Senegal.

This GIS analysis focuses on determining the significance of the existing urban-rural disparities in access to public goods such as healthcare in order to inform future policymaking in Senegal and other countries in the Sahel Region.

The geoprocessing model for this analysis highlights the relative availability of health centers by creating Euclidean distance-based buffers with 25 kilometer radiuses then calculating the populations inside and outside of these buffers. Specifically, the model classifies each geographic area depending on whether it is within a 25 kilometer buffer zone then multiplies the land area by popula-tion density per square kilometer using the Raster Calculator tool. Finally a zonal statistics calculation of the output of all individual rasters in the ana-lyzed area.

Specifically, population densities were based on the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) global population density estimates (FGGD) layer while health center locations in Senegal were compiled by the National-Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) as part of the Ebola response.

An Analysis of the Geographic Distribution of Healthcare Facilities in Senegal

Conclusion: Based on the GIS analysis explained in the geoprocessing model, approximately 10% (1.28 million) of the Senegalese population lives more than 25 kilometers from a listed health facility. While this is a relatively small percentage, it still en-compasses greater than 1 million Senegalese people, and is therefore quite note-worthy. In particular, the largest number of citizens living greater than 25 kilometers from a health center appear to be focused in the Senegalese departments to the east of Dakar but close to the coast including the Tivaouane, Kaolack and Gossas Depart-ments, while geographically larger rural areas such as the Bakel department have very few inhabitants. It should be noted that this geoprocessing model may underestimate the true number of people without close access to health facilities for three main reasons: 1) underlying factors related to census taking in rural, low-income areas; 2) the potential for inconsistent quality health services at various medical facilities, and; 3) the possible existence of other small health centers that are not included in the NGA dataset. It is also important to note that The Gambia, which is primarily sur-rounded by Senegal, is likely to have its own medical facilities which are not in-cluded in this model but may be accessible to Senegalese citizens.

Along with the primary analysis of a 25 KM buffer zone, the geoprocessing model can also be utilized to measure the proportion of Senegalese citizens within a closer 10 kilometer distance or a larger 50 kilometer distance from the nearest health center. As shown in Table 1 above, these alternative buffer distances show that a substantially larger proportion (~40%) of the Senegalese population lives at least 10 kilometers from a health center while only 4.4% of the population lives greater than 50 kilometers away from a medical facility. Bibliography: Administrative Boundaries: GADM, Database of Global Administrative Areas, Senegal Adm. 0 and Adm. 2, http://www.gadm.org/country, 2012.

African Continent Map: Map Library, Africa Library, http://www.mapmakerdata.co.uk.s3-website-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/library/stacks/Africa/index.htm, 2007.

Medical Center Locations: National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), http://ebolaopendata.nga.opendata.arcgis.com/datasets/046c85e898d6493ab395c300666931dd_1, 2015.

Population Density Map: UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Global Population Density Estimates (FGGD), http://data.fao.org/map?entryId=6d78b970-5883-11db-b1aa-000d939bc5d8, 2015.

Relief Map: ArcGIS Map Service, World Relief Map, http://tiles.arcgis.com/tiles/jIL9msH9OI208GCb/arcgis/rest/services.

Senegalese City Population and Area Data: Agence Nationale de la Statistique et de la Dé-mographie (ANSD), 2013.

Buffer Distance

Estimated Population without Healthcare Access

Percentage of Total Senegalese Population

10 KM 5.68 million 40.2% 25 KM 1.28 million 9.1%

50 KM 0.61 million 4.4%

Map Created by: Daniel Robinson

NUTR0231 - Fundamentals of GIS

Spring 2015

Figure 1: Senegal’s Location in the World

Scale: 60,000,000:1

Figure 2: Administrative Map of Senegal

Scale: 3,500,000:1

Figure 4: Population without Healthcare Access - 25 km Level

Scale: 2,500,000:1

Figure 8: Population without Healthcare

Access - 10 km Level

Scale: 2,500,000:1

Figure 9: Population without Healthcare

Access - 50 km Level

Scale: 2,500,000:1

Figure 5: Senegal’s Estimated Population Density

Scale: 2,500,000:1

Figure 6: Locations of Medical Facilities in Senegal

Scale: 2,500,000:1

Figure 7: Medical Facility Buffers and Roads

Scale: 2,500,000:1

Figure 3: Geoprocessing Model

Table 1: Geoprocessing Outcomes - Population without Healthcare Access