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This project wll reduce the incidence of child death and illness due to malaria in the Bugarika squatter settlement in Mwanza, Tanzania. It will be achieved through a programme of health education followed by the distribution of insecticide-treated nets to 3,500 children and 2,500 women of child-bearing age. It will be led by Professor Mwaluko M.D., Ph.D., one of Tanzania's leading experts in community health.

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Categories

  • Education/Training/Employment Education/​Training/​Employment
  • Health/Wellbeing Health/​Wellbeing
  • Beneficiaries

    • Children (3-18) Children (3-18)
    • Women & Girls Women & Girls

    Situation

    In September 2008 and April 2009 two trustees of Kids Aid Tanzania visited the Bugarika squatter settlement in Mwanza which is home to an estimated 12,000 people. They met Dr George Yamwaka who runs the Bugarika dispensary. He told them of his concerns at the high levels of malaria in the settlement, leading to the deaths of many children and the repeated illness of many others. He walked them round parts of the settlement showing the poverty which existed and the many breeding grounds for malaria-carrying mosquitoes. He explained that the people had come into Mwanza from rural areas seeking work, most unsuccessfully. Few understood how malaria was spread and, even if they did, could not afford to buy insecticide-treated bed nets to provide protection from bites at night. Health education was desperately needed followed by the distribution of nets. The trustees then met Professor Mwaluko M.D., Ph.D., one of Tanzania’s leading experts in community health. He regularly works on World Health Organisation projects and is presently Technical Adviser to TANESA, the NGO addressing HIV/AIDS in the Lakes Region of Tanzania and based in Mwanza (www.tanesalakezone.org). He provided them with published reports on successful projects for addressing malaria and stressed the importance of providing education before bed nets are distributed. Without this, they are often left unopened in people’s houses. He agreed to personally lead a project and make available the services of TANESA’s accountant to provide the necessary financial control. The project plan was put together by the visiting trustees, Professor Mwaluko and members of the Lions Club of Ilemela, in Mwanza, of which he was the founding President. Its immediate Past President is the director of one of the orphanages which has been working with Kids Aid Tanzania since 2005. There was agreement that the programme will be delivered using existing channels of communication for the Bugarika community developed by the government i.e. street chairmen and ten-cell leaders. Ten-cell leaders are elected to represent 10 – 20 households, by the households themselves. These, in turn, elect one of four street chairmen to represent Bugarika to local government. Education will initially be focussed on these people and traditional healers living in the settlement, and the ten-cell leaders will then lead the education programme for their groups of households with appropriate support from health workers. Club members have agreed to provide the administrative support for the project. The budget for the project is £35,000. Insecticide-treated nets, which have been approved by the World Health Organisation, are sufficiently rugged to withstand living conditions in the settlement and are guaranteed for 5 years, will be purchased from the factory in Tanzania where they are manufactured at a cost of £24,000. Promoting and delivering the health education component will cost £7,000. The balance of £4,000 is required for net storage and distribution, and a variety of travel and administration costs associated with setting up the project, delivering it and conducting a final review 12 months after its completion.

    Solution

    100%
    Categories

  • Education/Training/Employment Education/​Training/​Employment
  • Health/Wellbeing Health/​Wellbeing
  • Beneficiaries

    • Children (3-18) Children (3-18)
    • Women & Girls Women & Girls