PAMOJA HEALTH INITIATIVE
“Health Families & Health Communities”
Pamoja Health Initiative (PHI) is a health focused organization that promotes health empowerment among the youth and their communities through health education and sensitization, promotion of health seeking behaviors and building the capacity of the youth through skills development and nurturing them in entrepreneurship in order to reduce their socio-economic vulnerability to HIV infection, early pregnancy, domestic violence, maternal mortality and morbidity and other sexual reproductive health challenges. Our work builds the capacity of the youth to respond to sexual reproductive health challenge through increasing access to accurate information to help them make informed decisions, empowering the youth with life skills to bring a positive change in their behaviors as well as giving them a platform to connect and deliberate on the issues affecting their lives.
Background
Pamoja is a Swahili word meaning “Togetherness “which motivates us to come together in addressing the problems affecting humanity. Pamoja Health Initiative started as a 5% profit contribution of Pamoja Tour and Travel as a corporate socio responsibility (CSR) campaign to impact vulnerable communities. As a reputable and professional Tour and Travel company carrying out numerous safaris in diverse regions of East Africa ,Mr. Mukiibi sperito the proprietor of Pamoja Tours and travel and at the same time a Health Administrator specialist came together with other professionals to form Pamoja health Initiative to focus on the work of transforming lives of youth and impacting their communities.
To date, Pamoja Health Initiate has engaged communities to raise over 500 units of blood to Uganda Blood Bank Transfusion Services to help reduce maternal mortality and organized health camps which have impacted people with HIV Counseling and Testing services, reproductive health services, cervical cancer screening, Hepatitis B testing, Malaria prevention services, among others. While rendering these services we realized that there was a low uptake of these services by the young people. Many youth did not come for services because they had stigma, lacked life skills. We therefore came up into a health initiative to fill up the health gaps among the youth especially in the area of Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights. (SRHR)