Featured Project: Effect of Health Facility Resources on Access to Essential Medicines
February 15, 2013 | Posted by : aagaba | Community Monitoring,Community Score Card,Featured,Health,R4D,Uganda | 0 Comment»
Project title: Assessment of the Extent to which Resources Allocated to the Health Facilities Affect Access to Essential Medicines in Uganda. This is a three year project funded by the Results for Development Institute Inc (R4D) under the transparency and accountability Programme (TAP). It has research and advocacy components which are intended to improve accountability for health expenditures and health service delivery. Its goal is to improve the effectiveness of public spending and service delivery. It is jointly implemented by UNHCO and HEPS-Uganda in Bushenyi and Lira districts respectively. The project has so far been operational for two years during which a ...
Why Uganda Needs Strong Tobacco Control Measures
UNHCO and partners have launched an advocacy campaign in support of the tobacco control bill. The objectives of this campaign are: to galvanize support for the passage of the tobacco control bill; and to broaden the the voice of Civil Society Organisations in the passing of the tobacco control bill. Robinah Kaitiritimba (UNHCO's Executive Director) adds her autograph to an art-piece at the launch of the advocacy campaign in support of the tobacco control bill. In 2005 the world ratified the World Health Organization (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), the first public health treaty in history. ...
Remembering Dr. Samuel Lwanga
UNHCO pays tribute to its founder member and patron Dr. Samuel Lwanga who passed-on on 28th December 2012. Dr. Lwanga will always be remembered for his struggle to uphold the right to health in Uganda. In 1999 Dr. Samuel Lwanga led colleagues and advocates to create an institutional voice for patients. This gave birth to the Uganda National Health Users’/Consumers’ Organisation (UNHCO). [caption id="attachment_564" align="alignright" width="150" caption="Late Dr. Samuel Lwanga"][/caption] Fourteen (14) years on, UNHCO, popularly known as the “consumers’ representative” in the health sector is a formidable Non Government Organisation empowering communities to stand-up for their right to quality health services and contributing to policy processes at ...
UNHCO Community Monitoring Experience
The community Score Card as a Community Monitoring Tool. The Community Score Card (CSC) engages providers of services (duty bearers/health workers/ DHTs) and service users (Right Holders/health consumers/users) separately on various aspects of service delivery and then brings them together in an interface meeting to agree on priority service delivery issues and develop appropriate action plans to improve healthcare service delivery. The CSC uses the “community” as its unit of analysis, and is focused on assessing and capturing opinions and perceptions of the community at the local/facility level. Supported by the Open Society Foundations’ (OSF) Public Health Programme and the Open Society Initiative for Eastern Africa (OSIEA), UNHCO currently implements a project to promote transparency and accountability in ...
Maternal Deaths in Lwengo and Lyantonde Districts
Following unconfirmed reports of three mothers who died out of negligence of health workers at Lyantonde Hospital from a partner organisation, UNHCO set off to verify the information given. The District Chairperson’s View: The first stop was at the Lyantonde District Offices where we met the LC V Chairperson to share with us what he knew about the maternal deaths. The Chairperson informed us that he had heard of the allegations against the health workers but was waiting for a detailed report of the maternal death incidences from the District Health Officer. He however noted that there is a lack of follow-up by doctors who take-up treatment of pregnant mothers but along the way never follow-up. “This is a ...
UNHCO starts distributing Mama Kits
UNHCO has started distributing Mama Kits in the districts of Luweero, kamuli and Lyantonde. So far 160 Mama Kits have been distributed in the district of Luweero. The beneficiaries are mothers who deliver from public health facilities. The facilities that have benefitted from the exercise include: Kalagala HCIV, Nyimbwa HCIV, Kikoma HCIV, and Zirobwe HCIII. The exercise will continue and roll-out in the other two districts of Kamuli and Lyantonde. Supported By:
Building a Citizen Anti-Corruption Movement In Uganda
Download Communique by Clicking this Link: [download id="13"] Over the last decade, government has formulated a wide range of policies, action plans, enacted new laws and established new institutions to lead its anti-corruption efforts. However, these efforts have yielded substandard results and the recent developments raise doubts about the willingness of government to effectively address corruption. High profile corruption cases such as the Temangalo Scandal, the Global Fund Scandal, and the CHOGM scandal clearly show that we are losing the race against corruption. World Bank estimates show that Uganda loses an estimate of $300 million (Ugx 500 billion) annually to corruption. Likewise, the 2011 Transparency International Perception Index gives Uganda a decimal score of 2.4 on scale of ...
END PREVENTABLE MATERNAL DEATHS IN UGANDA – A CALL FOR ACTION BY CIVIL SOCIETY
September 27, 2011 PRESS STATEMENT END PREVENTABLE MATERNAL DEATHS IN UGANDA – A CALL FOR ACTION BY CIVIL SOCIETY This is a day before the Uganda Constitutional Court proceeds with a landmark court case on maternal deaths - Petition Number 16 of 2011, in which Civil Society Organizations working in the health sector have petitioned the constitutional court to declare that the avoidable deaths of women in the process of childbirth constitutes abuse of their right to health. The petition further argues that by not providing essential medical commodities and health services to pregnant women, the government is violating the constitutional rights of Ugandans. Pregnancy and childbirth should be a cause ...
Compensate Maternal Death Victims
Press Release on Maternal Health Petition Kampala, Thursday, 07/04/2011 – a Media Briefing of civil society organizations organized by the Uganda National Health Consumers’ Organization (UNHCO) has come up to speak against the unacceptable higher maternal deaths in Uganda. CONTRIBUTORY FACTORS include; - Non provision of the basic minimum maternal health care package due to continuous underfunding of the health sector, resulting in lack of emergency obstetric care, mal-functional infrastructure including absence of ambulance and referral services, inadequate human resources for maternal health, and poor or no supervision. The situation has been compounded by poor attitude of health workers. This situation has lead to death of especially vulnerable poor women who constitute the bigger percentage of the population and are bread winners ...
Maternal Health: the Legal Framework for Uganda
The importance of good health to a woman's well-being - and that of her family - cannot be overstated. Without healthy mothers, we cannot have healthy children. Without safe motherhood, women cannot fully exercise their fundamental human rights, such as those relating to education and employment. Although Uganda has a policy framework on maternal and child health, the national legal framework does not explicitly address the issue of maternal health. However, article 33(3) of the 1995 Constitution recognizes the need to protect the maternal functions of women including reproduction. It states that: “The State shall protect women and their rights, taking into account their unique status and natural maternal functions in society.” This provision recognizes that women have rights that arise ...