Initiative for Better Health Uganda - A different approach to change

The 2012 Poverty Status Report (MOFPED, 2012) points out those health-related shocks are one of the most important sources of vulnerability to absolute poverty. This is because ill-health can have a debilitating – and often long-term – impact on income-earning capacity, and poor households, who on average already spend 60% of their income on food, often devote a large share of their meager income to treatment of ailments that could have been prevented in the first place.

Indeed, the Ministry of Health maintains that there is an “unequivocal” link between the country’s poverty profile and the prevalence and incidence of such preventable and yet endemic disease conditions such as malaria, diarrhea, dysentery and others. According to the Ministry (2010), communicable diseases contribute more than half of the disability adjusted life years (DALYs) that Ugandans lose.  

Uganda will require “extra-ordinary efforts” to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which respectively target to reduce child mortality; improve maternal health; and combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other communicable diseases.