Health in 2007 - Supporting lives
In 2007 Concern implemented projects and programmes in the health sector in 17 countries.
The objective of the health programme is to contribute to the achievement of health and nutrition security of the poor within the context of the health related Millennium Development Goals - reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, combating HIV and AIDs, malaria and other diseases and ensuring environmental sustainability.
Outcomes
In our view the main achievements of our health programmes during 2007 were as follows:
- We expanded the Community Therapeutic Care/Community Management of Acute
Malnutrition (CTC/CMAM) programmes as planned (in Malawi and Ethiopia), and
integrated emergency CTC/CMAM programmes into existing government healthsystems. New CTC/CMAM programmes were developed in Timor Leste, Haiti,
North Sudan, Burundi and Bangladesh, and a new Mother and Child Care programme is planned in Niger. - The Child Survival Programme (CSP) was expanded in Rwanda from one to six
districts. We also documented lessons learnt in the programme (which now operates in 5 countries), in partnership with country offices and local partners. - In the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and Nepal we expanded the water supply
and sanitation programmes. - We consolidated and expanded current partnerships in the health sector. With Valid International, we are identifying further research objectives. We expanded relationships with RAISE and the Centre for Sustainable Urban Development at Columbia University, and began a new relationship with the International Food Policy
Research Institute (IFPRI), in the areas of nutrition, food security, HIV and Livelihoods.
During 2007 we conducted evaluations of eight country programmes in order to ensure
that they were meeting our heath programme objectives. Overall the outcomes were very positive and showed that significant lasting impacts were being achieved.
The studies/evaluations also indicated some areas that could be improved, the main
ones being the need:
- to ensure that efforts to increase usage and demand for health care are carefully managed so that they run in close parallel with work aimed at increasing the capacity of heath services to respond to such demand.
- for high quality research and documentation to ensure the ultimate success of our health programmes.
- for intensive upfront training in the initial phase of programmes and for creative
ways to provide regular technical support and review/
monitoring.
We will endeavour to build these insights into our programme design and ongoing programme work in 2008.
