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VillageReach services to reach five million in Northern Mozambique
On November 8, 2005, VillageReach and our implementing partner, the Foundation for Community Development (FDC), signed an agreement with the Ministry of Health to expand our successful healthcare and energy programs into the province of Nampula, Mozambique. Nampula province, southern neighbor to our Cabo Delgado demonstration project, is home to 3.5 million people. The expansion will bring VillageReach services to all 190 health facilities in the province, ultimately bringing the number of people served by the VillageReach project to 5 million, through 278 health facilities in Northern Mozambique.
Improving Access and Quality Since 2002, VillageReach has implemented and refined its successful pilot project in Cabo Delgado, demonstrating significant improvements in vaccination rates, cold chain reliability and healthcare delivery and education. Over the last year 58,861 children in Cabo Delgado completed their immunization schedule before their first birthday with vaccines delivered by VillageReach. This is a 36% increase over immunization rates in 2001, before VillageReach began services in Northern Mozambique.
VillageReach has made a significant impact on how and when vaccines and other medical supplies reach rural clinics. In August 2004, VillageReach implemented new coordination practices to streamline VillageReach and MoH activities and improve vaccine management. Clinics are now experiencing dramatically fewer stockouts of vaccines and other supplies delivered by VillageReach: in June of 2005, less than 5% of the 88 participating clinics ran out of any vaccine, compared with 80% in June of 2004.
Replicating Success VillageReach services in Nampula will mirror our successful program in Cabo Delgado. VillageReach will install essential equipment needed to provide core health services, including refrigerators to store temperature-sensitive vaccines and other medical supplies, burners for sterilization, and lamps for nighttime medical emergencies such as childbirth. VillageReach will also work with the MoH to implement new waste management practices, ensuring the safe disposal of infectious materials.
In addition to critical equipment, VillageReach will provide monthly deliveries of vaccines and other medical supplies to all clinics in the province. Supplies include auto-disable (single-use) syringes, and sharps boxes for safe needle disposal. VillageReach tracks the use of supplies to ensure that deliveries are meeting local needs, and to assist the MoH to make more effective purchases.
VillageReach field teams also deliver energy in the form of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), also known as propane, for refrigerators, lamps and burners. They perform routine maintenance checks on equipment and review clinic safety and record keeping practices. Monthly visits by VillageReach field teams help keep health workers doing their best. Our field coordinators, who are experienced in public health, support health workers by answering questions, modeling effective work practices and by reinforcing that their work is important and valued.
A Sustainable Model VillageReach and FDC are working to transfer knowledge and management of our successful program to the MoH. By empowering MoH staff to use these effective systems and tools, VillageReach, FDC and the MoH hope to make VillageReach strategy routine to improving access to and quality of services in the national healthcare system. VillageReach Regional Manager Henrique Pinto, and Senior Field Coordinator Alfredo Durao will train MoH employees in Nampula and Cabo Delgado. The three organizations will also collaborate on best practices to enhance community participation, waste management and injection safety in the health care system.
As part of the expansion into Nampula, VillageReach and FDC will also expand VidaGas into Nampula province. VidaGas is a Mozambican company founded by VillageReach and FDC to distribute LPG, or propane gas. VidaGas helps to support VillageReach healthcare programs by supplying a consistent source of energy for clinic equipment. VidaGas also provides propane to area households and businesses. In the Cabo Delgado province where VidaGas currently operates, propane sales have helped to boost the local economy by sparking new businesses and providing existing ones, like restaurants and hotels, with a faster, cleaner and more efficient fuel source for their operations. Use of LPG is also replacing the use of biomass fuels which have harmful effects both on the environment and human health.
Seeing Change “VillageReach and VidaGas have had a visible impact on Cabo Delgado,” says Maria Gomes, VillageReach’s country manager. “The steady supply of vaccines at clinics has more people using health care services. More small businesses are appearing, and they are able to be more productive with energy from VidaGas. We are happy to have the government’s full support behind us and excited to bring these services to Nampula.”
Hear one clinic's story about the benefits of VillageReach
VillageReach supports Mozambique's national campaign against measles, polio
In July 2005, VillageReach assisted the national campaign to vaccinate all Mozambican children against measles. The campaign was the largest vaccination effort in Mozambican history, aimed to eradicate the presence of the disease, the most highly transmissible in the world and one of the leading causes of death in Mozambique. Children between the ages of 9 months and 14 years received the vaccine, while children under five also received vaccines against polio and doses of Vitamin A to boost immune function. VillageReach field coordinators and drivers joined teams of medical personnel in the province of Cabo Delgado to assist in the effort, which distributed over 1,703,900 vaccines and vitamins in Cabo Delgado alone.
VillageReach leveraged its established logistics system and cold chain, waste management and training experience to support the campaign. VillageReach Field Coordinators and Drivers delivered large volumes of vaccines and other supplies to targeted vaccination sites, helped transport campaign staff and volunteers to remote vaccination sites and supported the campaign during the preparatory phase. Using years of experience in public health service, VillageReach staff oversaw stock management, quality control and temperature monitoring to ensure that vaccines and supplies were properly handled and stored. VillageReach also provided additional refrigerators to accommodate the large number of temperature-sensitive vaccines used in the effort, and financed the construction of 45 waste pits to ensure that used needles and other campaign waste was disposed of safely.
The campaign in Cabo Delgado was a great success. Nearly 627,560 children received a vaccine against measles, reaching 92% of the target. The campaign also fully immunized 366,828 children under five against polio, 133% of the campaign goal. Polio still remains a threat in several African countries, though national campaigns like this one have nearly eliminated new cases in Mozambique. Nearly 305,130 children under five, 25% more than the target population, received supplements of vitamin A, a vitamin critical to immune function and to the prevention of blindness.
The measles campaign involved the efforts of hundreds of health professionals, volunteers, governmental groups, non-governmental organizations, celebrities, students, theater groups, private institutions and foundations. VillageReach's participation was made possible through a generous grant from the Izumi foundation.
International development leaders recognize VillageReach
Namacande clinic back in business
With no way to keep the temperature-sensitive vaccines cold, the 2,187 people who rely on the Namacande clinic for medical care were often forced to walk over two hours to the next clinic for vaccinations. Justine, a young nurse of mother and infant health, remembers that people stopped coming to the Namacande clinic entirely.
In 2005, VillageReach provided a gas refrigerator and lamp to the clinic, and began regular deliveries of vaccines, syringes, gas and other medical supplies. For the first time in as long as Justine and Robene, the clinic director, could remember, the Namacande clinic had vaccines. Justine is thrilled for her community, she says, because people are coming back to the clinic to make sure their children receive vaccinations and other medical attention.
Making contact as a VillageReach Field Coordinator
When asked what the most important part of his job is, Sr. Quirinde replies, “Sharing my experience and knowledge with the clinic workers. The clinic workers receive training, but the training needs to be updated and consolidated on a regular basis. Every month when I visit, I share some of my experience and knowledge to improve their training. It really is making clinic operations better.”
We also welcomed
two new members to the Seattle team: Leah Barrett and Emily Bowerman. Leah
Barrett, a masters student at the University of
Emily Bowerman joined the Seattle team in October 2005. As Project Analyst, Emily manages internal communication, administration and finances for the Seattle office. In addition, she is pursuing her M.A. in Policy Studies at the University of Washington, Bothell.
Your contribution makes all the difference Here are some examples of how VillageReach is increasing access and quality of health services for children and families in the most remote regions of the developing world.
$30 provides a health clinic with safe and timely delivery of one month's worth of vaccines and other medical supplies, ensuring that patients are never turned away because the vaccine they need is unavailable.
$60 provides a bicycle that will allow clinic staff to travel to remote villages to provide desperately needed vaccinations and other medical care.
$160 provides a clinic with a propane-powered burner to sterilize medical equipment, ensuring that clinic patients and staff do not contract diseases through contaminated syringes or other instruments.
Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to support our life-saving projects today. Click here to learn more about our giving options, or make a secure online contribution right now though groundspring.org. You can also send your contribution to us by mail at:
601 N 34th Street Seattle, WA 98103
Get involved Join our mailing list, become a volunteer, make an introduction, spread the word! Please click here to learn more ways to get involved with VillageReach.
We're always interested in any ideas you may have to help us succeed in improving essential services for the poorest populations around the world. Please contact us if you have any suggestions or would like more information on how you can help VillageReach to "go the last mile".
Thank you for your support!
VillageReach 601 N 34th Street Seattle, WA 98103 USA (ph) 206-925-5203 (f) 206-925-5201 info@villagereach.org |
The
measles campaign
was a significant undertaking for public health in Mozambique. The
campaign targeted children not just between 9 and 24 months, the standard
age at which to receive childhood vaccinations, but all children under 14 years of age.
This was because unusually high numbers of case of measles has been
occurring among segments of the population who should have been covered
against the disease. Between
1997 and 2003, over 85,000 cases of measles were reported in Mozambique,
with the majority occurring in children over 24 months. Many of these
children were teenagers who had missed their routine vaccinations due to
the aftermath of Mozambique’s 16 year civil war, which ended in 1992.
This campaign was an effort to reach those children cut off from
life-saving preventative medicine by the upheaval of years of civil
unrest.
At
the Namacande clinic in
northern Cabo Delgado, refrigerator problems were common occurrences
before VillageReach. The kerosene refrigerator broke frequently, and
although the staff was excited when they received a new solar
refrigerator, they were never able to use it, as the solar panels were
stolen before any vaccines arrived.
VillageReach field coordinators have a long history in public service and
public health in Mozambique. Sr. Quirinde started as a primary school
teacher during colonial times and then began a career in preventative
medicine. He served as director of a District hospital and as part of the
health directorate for Cabo Delgado province before joining
VillageReach. Sr. Quirinde openly shares his belief that “VillageReach
is the best thing for the Ministry of Health.” 
Our Mozambique
headquarters in Maputo recently welcomed on board Jo
