Health and education stories from Garissa, Kenya
Every story from our field notes: the photographs, the conversation, and what it means for Garissa.
When a budget meeting is a life-saving meeting
Garissa’s health executive and its budget-makers sit at one table to deliberate maternal and newborn health — and agree the way forward together.
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Why a girl in northern counties should never miss school because she cannot afford a pad
Menstrual health support, dignity kits and school advocacy that keep Garissa’s girls learning.
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An award for Fountain of Hope’s Family Planning 2030 advocacy
A moment of recognition for a movement that belongs to the women who carry it — and the work it represents.
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Where Okoa Mama na Mtoto first came together
A workshop with ICRHk, BMG and women grassroots sets out to implement Okoa Mama na Mtoto — reducing maternal mortality, child death and morbidity, accelerating SDG 2030.
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Women of faith on the frontline
Religious women leaders implement the second activity of Okoa Mama na Mtoto — advocating maternal and newborn health across Garissa.
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SASA: a national commitment to save mothers
The SASA Alliance launches in Nairobi to address the maternal health crisis — grassroots women champions, present to show the commitment.
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The Free Fistula Camp: healing and hope in Garissa
A week-long Free Fistula Camp in Garissa, May 2019 — corrective surgery and care for women living with obstetric fistula, and a stand that no woman should suffer its shame.
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Fountain of Hope’s first year of activity — in photographs
A first photo-archive of 2018, the first year of activity: sanitary towel donations for a menstrual hygiene program, community courtesy calls, and the seeds of the work Garissa’s mothers and girls would build on.
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A glass of milk, and a reason to stay in school
For ten weeks, 59 ECD pupils in Nanigi Primary and 210 in Iftin Primary received milk twice a week — a small intervention against child malnutrition, and for enrollment and retention in school.
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Four counties, one table — grassroots champions at the Gates Foundation office
Grassroots women health champions from four counties shared their experience and impact with Madam Rachel Toku-Appiah at the newly opened Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Kenya office in Nairobi, May 2024.
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A signature against gender-based violence in Garissa
Fountain of Hope witnessed the signing of an MoU between the County Government of Garissa and the National Government on Gender-Based Violence, at the Garissa Child Protection Unit — 26 November 2018.
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Porridge flour and Mackintosh covers for the wards of Garissa
On 20 April 2018, the Garissa community joined Fountain of Hope in donating Mackintosh bed covers and porridge flour to the Maternity and Pediatric Wards at Garissa Referral Hospital.
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A holistic approach in advocacy of menstrual hygiene
An exhilarating moment — Fountain of Hope at UNDP Kenya for a Holistic Approach in Advocacy of Menstrual Hygiene Management, 30 April 2018.
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The child-spacing advocacy journey in Garissa
An FP2020 Rapid Response Mechanism project, supported by the United Nations Foundation, used culture- and faith-sensitive advocacy on child spacing in a county whose modern contraceptive prevalence rate stood at 5.5% — reporting child-spacing service uptake of 11% by 2022.
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