“Chasing Mosquitoes”: The Importance of Entomological Surveillance in the Fight Against Malaria
As a Malaria Control Program Officer and a Global Health Corps Fellow at PATH in Zambia, I conduct entomological surveillance of mosquito species. This has earned me the nicknames “Mosquito Chaser,” “Mosquito Hunter” and (the most hilarious) “Mosquito Whisperer” from my co-fellow Lis. But what exactly is entomology? Hence, what is entomological surveillance? What data […]
Why I am passionate about my work
September 28, 2014 was my first training workshop facilitation since I started my Global Health Corps fellowship. I had been preparing for two months for this moment, and was nervous as I looked out into the crowd of faces before me, many of whom were much older than me. I had been tasked with training […]
Gender Based Violence & Sports: A Critical Examination
One of the most important lessons I have learned in the first half of my fellowship year is to own your personal narrative. A big part of defining your personal narrative revolves around identifying those things that excite you and that you are passionate about. For me that passion is soccer—or more appropriately football/futbol! It […]
Zambian Chief Tells of How His Chiefdom Attained ODF Status in a Single year
Chief Mukobela is one of the first chiefs to attain open defecation free status (ODF) for his chiefdom in Zambia. Having attained ODF status in 2013 after the community led total sanitation program (CLTS) was introduced in 2012, His Royal Highness has gone further and has begun working on a sustainable approach to maintain adequate […]
Community solutions: Membership-based community health financing and insurance program
Co-Authored by James Kaggwa & Rebecca Calderara 2014 – 2015 Co-fellows at Spark Microgrants As GHC Fellows at Spark Microgrants, we are working with five remote communities in […]
The [neuro]science of operations management
When typing an email, we expect with a great deal of certainty that our thoughts will translate to words on the screen through the movement of our fingers across a keyboard. The pressing of a finger on a key is the output of a highly efficient process whose origins can be traced through the body […]
Integrated Tools and Collaborative Community: Making Tech Work Better for Social-Impact Organizations
I’ve spent the past two months working on openFn, a non-profit, open-source project that aspires to eventually allow social-impact organizations to incorporate new information technology solutions as effortlessly as you add apps to a smartphone. The project builds on something I, and so many other fellows, learned during the Global Health Corps (GHC) fellowship. Information […]
“My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.” – Audrey Lorde
At the age of 13, I learned the hard way that there are times when silence becomes a piercing scream. When my grandmother was diagnosed with leukemia, the silence was deafening. Over a decade later, I still recall her sense of defeat as she painfully transformed from a strong woman, full of wisdom to solve […]
Celebrating The Life That Gives Life To Millions of Life in Rural Eastern Uganda: Celementina
On a sunny Tuesday afternoon, Brooke (my supervisor) and I visited Celementina, a traditional birthing attendant who has a longstanding relationship with the S.O.U.L Foundation. She delivers babies at her birthing center in Buwenda, a village about a 20 minute walk from Kyabirwa village, where the S.O.U.L Foundation is located. Devin (my co-fellow) and I […]
Beer: A Silent Determinant of Health
What is the power of beer on health? Since my youth, I have been drinking traditionally brewed beers and was told that if I wanted to become a strong and respected man I would do so. This included drinking both the sorghum and banana beer that my parents would brew at home. As time went […]