Betty lives in Kampala’s Ki-Mombasa slum, where women face several barriers when trying to access family planning services. But that all changed in March when The Challenge Initiative, its implementing partner Jhpiego and the Kampala Capital City Authority held an...
The Challenge Initiative (the Initiative) made headlines last month in Nigeria when Her Royal Highness the Omu of Asaba, Dr. Ada Biosah, agreed to serve as family planning champion in Delta State. As a traditional ruler with international standing, Biosah will help...
There isn’t much that Isaiah Chebrot, M.D., doesn’t love about public health. “You learn a lot about protecting and improving the health of people and their communities. I love working with people from all walks of life,” he says, adding that he wants to see Kampala...
The Lisabi Festival is one of the most celebrated and well-attended festivals in Ogun State, Nigeria. It is held in remembrance of Lisabi, a warrior who rescued the Egba people from oppression in the 18th century. The Challenge Initiative’s family planning...
U.K. celebrity Stacey Solomon visited Kampala, Uganda, March 5 and 6 with U.K. charity Comic Relief to meet women living in the Ki-Mombasa slum of Kawempe District and then participated in an integrated community outreach event held by The Challenge Initiative and the...
Manisha is a family planning provider at an urban primary health center (UPHC) in Sant Nagar, which is located in the city of Firozabad in Uttar Pradesh, India. She recently recalled how another district once referred a young woman with five children to her for family...
The total population of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania is about 133 million people and growing. Yet, many women who want to avoid pregnancy are not using safe and effective family planning methods. The reasons range from lack of access to information, services and...
Melinda Gates participated in a high-level roundtable Jan. 25 in Nairobi, Kenya, to hear firsthand about the Kenya activities of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s largest and most innovative family planning investment – The Challenge Initiative. The...
Contributor: Allan Katamba Kampala, Uganda – When the Challenge Initiative launched in March 2017 in Kenya, the Ugandan Minister of State for Health, Hon. Sarah Opendi, in her remarks promised that at least 10 districts from Uganda would soon apply to become...
Delta State First Lady Dame Edith Okowa has emerged as one of the Challenge Initiative’s first major champions in Nigeria. Okowa became interested back in October 2017, when the Nigeria team visited her office in Asaba, the Delta state capital, during the...
“I don’t want my child to face the same hardships as we are facing and that is why I send him to school,” says Salma. Salma migrated with her husband and child to Gau ghat, a small urban slum in Allahabad situated right beside the stench-filled Yamuna bank in the...
Advocacy efforts undertaken by The Challenge Initiative for Healthy Cities (TCIHC) in India include partnering with government leadership and other relevant stakeholders to encourage policy-level changes that would allow for more engagement of the private sector in...
