woman, child, health, Haiti

HAITI

Improving maternal and child health under the Muskoka initiative

© AFD

AFD is supporting this project in the context of the commitments made by in Muskoka in 2010. Its overall objective is to contribute to improving maternal and child health by increasing access to health services and their quality and use in three departments in Haiti: Grand’Anse, the South and Northwest.

CONTEXT 01/01/2016 The Grand’Anse department is a mountainous agricultural Project start region whose health situation is marked by infectious and date parasitic diseases and nutritional deficiencies. Cholera has Departments of Grand’Anse, the become endemic. Child health is seriously affected (46% of South and the Northwest children under 5 suffer from a fever syndrome). Location

The South department is mainly rural (78%). It is an area prone Health and Social Protection to risks of flooding and cyclones. The high level of sector(s) deforestation, combined with marked and high population density, makes the region extremely vulnerable to Grant climate hazards. The department remains underserved in terms financing tool(s) of health. 8 000 000 EUR The Northwest department is very isolated. This rural Financing amount department is characterized by vulnerability to climate hazards (drought), deforestation and erosion. The remoteness from The project will have a total of health centers and poor quality of the road network pose a real some 900000 beneficiaries problem in terms of access to healthcare. Less than 30% of including over 400000 direct childbirths take place in a health structure. beneficiaries Beneficiaries In 2015, AFD launched a call for proposals concerning a project to improve maternal and child health in the Grand’Anse, South and Northwest departments. A consortium led by Médecins du Monde was selected for the project implementation. This group has strong expertise in mother and child health and family planning. The project includes a gender-based component on violence, which is highly prevalent in Haiti. It fits in with the commitments made by France in Muskoka in 2010, which aim to increase France’s contribution to achieving Millennium Development Goals 4 (reduce ) and 5 (improve maternal health).

DESCRIPTION

The project aims to improve maternal and child health:

Build the community’s capacities in order to encourage people to seek out maternal and child healthcare (MCH) and family planning (FP) and promote sexual and reproductive rights: provide effective access to MCH/FP healthcare, which will be increased by the activities to strengthen health centers and structure referral systems. Improve the quality of health structures and upgrade their mother/child and reproductive services: 21 health structures have been pre-identified (7 for each department). The strategy will be based on a skills transfer at several levels: Strengthen the departmental health departments and district health centers (DHC) to provide the population with access to high-quality and appropriate MCH/FP services.

This project aims to develop a major institutional support component for the health authorities. The institutions will receive technical and financial assistance in order to build their capacities to conduct and supervise the MCH/FP activities. Gender/adolescent health, integration of psychosocial issues: Gender-related violence is widespread in Haiti. 13% of women have been victims of sexual violence during their lifetime and 28% of women aged between 15 and 49 have been victims of physical violence. The project will take psychosocial issues into account in a cross-cutting manner. Nutrition: The project will work on malnutrition prevention, in conjunction with the Nutrition Strategic Plan 2013-2018: focus on prevention and awareness-raising activities, by integrating prevention and detection into reproductive health (RH) services. Special attention will be paid to the level of post- natal consultations.

IMPACTS

Reduction of maternal-child mortality rate, with an improvement in care before, during and after childbirth and greater financial and geographical access to care; Consolidation of a healthcare and referral system that is inclusive at all levels of the health pyramid and strengthening of health departments; Increase in access to and the use of MCH/FP services; Reduction of the geographical isolation of the hardest-to- reach communities by improving referral systems and supporting the most remote health centers; Greater community participation in national policy choices.