NCDA full member

About Amref Health Africa

Amref is the largest Africa-led international organization reaching more than 11 million people annually through health programing in over 35 countries in Africa. We are focused on addressing challenges in Africa’s health environment e.g. burden of disease caused by infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases and maternal and neonatal mortality; human resource for health gap; under-investment in health and the vibrant youthful population in Africa.

Amref’s programing is built on three pillars:

• 1. Human resource for health (HRH) – seeks to develop and sustain HRH to catalyze the attainment of Universal Health Coverage (UHC) in Africa. Specific focus areas are: Increasing the number and skill-mix of primary health care workers, including community health workers; Strengthening leadership, management and governance capacities within primary health care systems, including communities;
• 2. Innovative health services and solutions – seeks to develop and deliver sustainable health services and solutions for improved access to, and utilization of quality preventive, curative and restorative health services in Africa;
• 3. Health Care Financing – aims at contributing to increased investments in health to achieve UHC by strengthening financial protection for disadvantaged communities to reduce out-of-pocket expenditure and conduct community advocacy for increased investments in health for availability of quality health services.

Amref Health Africa's work around NCDs

Amref prioritized three scalable models to tackle NCDs: Integration of NCDs into existing Primary Health Care initiatives e.g. community health services; advocacy to influence policy change, and people empowerment through wellness festivals to promote regular screening, wellness information sharing and household behavior change on NCD modifiable risk factors.

In Ethiopia, Amref works with partners to improve early screening, diagnosis, treatment and survival of lung cancer in Afar state, Ethiopia. As at December 2021, a total of 121 healthcare workers and 59 community health volunteers had been trained in promoting lung cancer health care provision. To improve practice for early diagnosis, palliative care and survivorship support for lung cancers, at least 4043 community members directly sensitized, and 514 patients screened.

In Kenya, Amref works to reduce cancer burden by promoting cancer awareness to improve health seeking behavior of communities, as well as reducing the cancer morbidity and mortality through mass clinical screenings by Community Health Volunteers (CHVs). Additionally, Amref in partnership with the MoH developed and digitized cancer curriculum on mobile learning platform- leap. Through leap, at least 1000 CHVs have trained and are carrying out home visits to create awareness, conducting screenings and treatment referrals for cancer patients. Leveraging the potential of CHVs through capacity building on cancer care and management has proven effective in increasing community knowledge on cancer, consequently, improving health seeking behavior for cancer screening among patients.

Our ask: We are open for partnerships with philanthropic organizations, social impact investors, wellness service providers, and corporates to further strengthen efforts to reverse the growing trends of NCDs in Africa. Together, let’s beat NCDs!

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Langata Road
PO Box 27691-00506
Nairobi
Kenya

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