Sponsor a Child in Uganda

 
Map of Uganda
  • ChildFund came to Uganda: 1980
  • Population below poverty line: 35%

Disease Prevention and Healthcare

Malaria, respiratory infections and diarrhea are the primary cause of death for children under 5 in Uganda. ChildFund Uganda’s health interventions are focused on disease control; reproductive (maternal and adolescent) health and family planning; and water, sanitation and environmental health.

Malaria interventions focus on training community members to provide community-based treatment and working with government health units. ChildFund’s malaria prevention program teaches children and families the importance of using treated bed nets to avoid exposure. Prevention activities include providing mosquito treated nets to pregnant women and children. ChildFund also has supported 50 community-based organizations to provide immunization, diarrhea and malaria prevention services and access to clean water and proper sanitation.

“As a sponsored child, I had access to medical facilities (regular health, dental and vision care). I also benefited from the fact that I no longer had to miss school because of unpaid fees.”

– Katherine

Basic childhood immunizations are provided through community-based organizations and safe water and sanitation campaigns are conducted to reduce disease. For Katherine, a former sponsored child who is now one of the top news managers for a Uganda radio station, a ChildFund sponsor turned her life around. “As a sponsored child, I had access to medical facilities (regular health, dental and vision care). I also benefited from the fact that I no longer had to miss school because of unpaid fees.”

Early Childhood Development

From birth to five years is the most critical time of development in a child’s life. In Uganda, we have built more than 70 Early Childhood Development Centers in 40 communities to provide health, nutrition, and psychosocial and cognitive development assistance. Communities are vital to the success of the centers, which is why parents contribute more than 50 percent of the food their children consume while at the center. They also help ensure there are volunteers to work at the centers.

The centers provide regular child and maternal health services, including routine immunization, growth monitoring, training on the prevention and control of infectious disease and hygiene education. While the centers provide students with nutritious meals, they also operate demonstration gardens and kitchens to work with community members to develop a more nutritious diet.

Orphans and Vulnerable Children

ChildFund’s OVC programs target orphaned children as well as those who are themselves infected by HIV/AIDS, children who have been abused or neglected, children who have been affected by armed conflict and other children who are made vulnerable by their social or economic status. ChildFund Uganda strengthens the capacity of families and communities to protect and provide care for these children.

An estimated 1.2 million children and adults in Uganda are living with HIV/AIDS, 64,000 of whom die annually. The scourge of this horrific disease leaves those affected with little to no treatment and leaves the young people left behind without parents or caregivers. At a national level, ChildFund Uganda’s priority HIV/AIDS interventions focus on behavioral change by providing information, education and services to young people and their communities. Communication campaigns aimed at youth, parents, teachers and community leaders have been developed to promote HIV/AIDS education in schools, facilitate parent-child discussions, work with the media to promote facts and support the creation of performances and discussions in communities through drama and sporting activities.

The ChildFund livelihood security strategy is designed to support parents and caregivers in mitigating the effects of poverty, HIV/AIDS and conflict on children. Interventions to reduce the conditions that leave children and their families vulnerable include promoting entrepreneurship skills, developing savings and loans systems, working with partners to teach farmers how to improve production, providing start-up farm inputs and seeds and supporting vocational skills training.

Education

ChildFund Uganda’s primary focus regarding education is guaranteeing OVCs access to quality education. In schools, teachers and school counselors are sensitized about how best to support OVCs, many of whom are HIV positive and have experienced the death of a parent or caregiver. ChildFund has established school counseling desks in 42 schools in 30 districts to provide a focal point for student support and guidance. Additional activities include supporting infrastructure development and basic school facilities, providing vocational training for out-of-school youth, promoting adolescent health and HIV/AIDS prevention, and supporting music, dance and drama performances on themes like gender-based violence, girls’ education and child rights.

Sponsor a child in Uganda to help continue these life-changing services.
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Emergency Relief

In much of northern and eastern Uganda, 20 years of civil war took a heavy toll on children. It is estimated that as many as 26,000 children were abducted, raped and forced into servitude and military combat. ChildFund Uganda’s Emergency Response Unit worked with displaced children in the Lango and Teso regions of Nothern Uganda providing. ChildFund Uganda has a comprehensive protection mechanism for children and communities that would be rolled out in case of a conflict situation.