Photo story: Supporting women through motherhood

In Uganda, women are custodians of their children's well-being and are often the main care giver. In our communities. Through small income generating activities, such as agriculture, small time trading, and labour provision, they can help run their households and care for their families.

During pregnancy and in the first six months of a child’s life, the mother is usually the only source of food. Since both mother and baby have an increased need for vitamins and minerals during this period, the mother must ensure they both stay healthy. As a part of our Comic Relief-funded ICCM+ project in eastern Uganda and in cooperation with Vitamin Angels and government, we have delivered multivitamin supplements to mothers.

As a part of the project, we have also facilitated village health clubs to pass on health knowledge to mothers on how to care for themselves and their children.The village health clubs are led by Malaria Consortium-trained village health team members (VHTs) who also conduct monthly house visits. They visit new mothers a few days after they have given birth to check on how the mother and baby are doing and provide postnatal care.

VHTs also encourage mothers to attend ANC check ups at their local health facility to register their child's birth, monitor the growth of their newborn, receive tips on best practices for breastfeeding and umbilical cord care. Many mothers have to juggle these new responsibilities with their usual commitments to provide for the household.

Household visits are additionally important as VHTs are trained to recognise and treat childhood illnesses like pneumonia and diarrhoea. We also complement the work of the USAID funded project, MAPD, leveraging its work on improving hospital referral systems. VHTs can refer mothers higher up the health system if they are unable to treat the case at the community level.

VHTs also deliver social and behaviour change interventions. Mothers like these in Malere take part in the village health clubs, as well as community dialogues, radio spots and  performing drama skits around health issues.

Through these activities, the VHTs are also generating demand for their work as word gets around about the benefits of using their services. Mothers have another important role here – to encourage male community members to also learn about the benefits of the services and overcome any skepticism they may have.

As children blossom into adults, the mothers role becomes more advisory. We find the older generations share their experiences to support young people and support their families to adjust to new realities and challenges in the community and households. They take on a central role in the family during deaths, births and the celebration of life.

Elsewhere in the community, Malaria Consortium works with local schools and education authorities to carry out school health programmes. As a part of this activity, health messages are given to children and parents simultaneously. In this way, children learn about health while parents are also able to pass on what they learn at the village health club meetings to other mothers. By including parents in school-based health education, we hope to improve the sustainability of the activities.

Mothers are at the centre of the household; as expectant mothers, new mothers, old mothers and grandmothers. They are also at the centre of efforts to look after the health of their families. They work hand in hand with VHTs and school programmes to learn about best health practices and they are encouraged to share their knowledge. To learn more about our iCCM + project, click here.