“I am a mother. I protect my Baby”
USAID in collaboration with the National Malaria Control Programe (NMCP) and the Provincial Health Department (DPS) of Bié province, held the official launch of a communication campaign to promote the use of mosquito nets on July 17.
The launching ceremony took place at the Polytechnic Institute of Bié, in Cuito, and included representatives of the USAID /PMI, the presence of officials of the NMCP, DPS of Bié and other bilateral partners of malaria control and the media in the province.
This campaign is part of therate of support and funding given by USAID /PMI to the NMCP to implement its strategy of reducing the malaria incidence rate in the country. This support essentially reinforces actions for prevention that also include the free distribution of bed nets. In 2014, the province of Bie received from PMI 876,226 nets benefiting 1,586,544 people.
The communication campaign called “I am Mother. I protect my Baby” targets women caretakers of children under five years of age in rural and peri-urban areas. The campaign will take place from the period of July 2015 to September 2016 and initially will be implemented in the provinces of Bié, Huambo, Malange, Uige and Benguela.
The communication strategy involves interpersonal communication and mass communication with activities such as house-to-house visits, educational lectures, testimonials on the radio, community meetings and others in order to create support and motivation for adopting the desired behavior. In order to expand the possibilities for action training plan for DPS’s communication strategy on behavior change. So far 14 DPS members were trained in Bie, including health promoters and municipal malaria supervisors.
The communication campaign will cover the nine municipalities of the province of Bie, the first steps in will be taking in the municipalities of Cuito, Cunhinga, Camacupa and Catabora, where already 60 community communication educators were trained in interventions.
