reach everywhere
Our Work in the DRC
VillageReach has worked in the DRC since 2015, collaborating with the Ministry of Public Health, Hygiene and Prevention (MoH), the private sector and other partners to develop and implement high-impact sustainable solutions and programs, including Next Generation of Supply Chain (NGCA), Supply Chain Investment Coordination and Advocacy (SCICA), and Drones for Health.
Our work improves health care delivery by building tech-enabled pathways to primary health care and making health products available to people when and where they are needed.
Resources
Using private sector firms for outsourced transportation in public health systems
Optimized Supply Chain Model Reduces Health System Costs in DRC
SCICA Overview
Drones for Health: Boosting Access to Lifesaving Products
Demonstrating the Potential of Drones for Vaccine Transport to Remote Communities
Insights Before Flights: How Community Perceptions Can Make or Break Medical Drone Deliveries
How to select a drone service provider
Integrating Drones into the Health Supply Chain in DR Congo
Leading from all levels: supply chain leadership capacity in Equateur, DRC
Integrating Drones into Immunization Supply Chains: DRC Case Study
Introducing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) for Vaccine Transport in the DRC
Increasing Access to Health Products in the DRC
The potential of next-generation supply chains to ease DRC’s “Casse-tête”
DRC Supply Chain Assessment (English)
Watch & Learn
Améliorer l’accès aux soins de santé pour tous (2:46)
VillageReach croit qu’un autre monde est possible, un monde où chacun a les soins de santé nécessaires pour s’épanouir. Apprenez-en davantage sur la façon dont nous réimaginons les voies d’accès aux soins de santé primaires et sur la façon dont nous fournissons des produits aux gens pour transformer la prestation des soins de santé afin d’atteindre tout le monde.
The DRC by the Numbers
81.4M estimated population
70% employed in agriculture
17,000+ community health
workers received PPE
in 2020-21
1M+ Kinshasa children received vaccine against polio
in 2020-21
Our DRC team is led by Country Director Freddy Nkosi
Ensuring that health products reach everywhere, wherever people are, for continued provision of health services through innovative solutions, by putting the government’s needs first and partnering with the private sector, is a priority for VillageReach, in order to contribute to universal health coverage in DRC.”
It Takes A Village
Impact Story
– Olivier Defawe, VillageReach Director, Health Systems
To watch the first day’s fleet of drones transport vaccines, medicine and laboratory samples to and from a tiny, hard-to-reach village called Widjifake was unimaginable — especially to this community who had never seen something so up close that could fly. The delivery took about 20 minutes compared to a six hour round trip journey by car or motorcycle on roads and worn down paths. I was awestruck to watch the same vaccines that were delivered by drone being administered to seven children at the Widjifake health center that day, a first in the DRC and Central Africa.
Vaccinodrome Launches
Impact Story
We are eager to leverage the vaccinodrome and make vaccines readily available to people, especially where they are needed,”
– Dr. Elisabeth Mukamba Musenga, National Director of the EPI program in the DRC
With the support of the Provincial Health Division of Kinshasa and the EPI, a vaccinodrome has been set up at the Place des Évolués in the community of Gombe. The first site, which will be installed for the next three months, is located in one of the busiest districts of Kinshasa that is surrounded by several bus stops, hotels, institutions and office buildings. It will hope to vaccine 400 people per day.
