Delivering Child Health Campaigns with CommCare Connect

Dimagi and partners have developed a Child Health Campaign within CommCare Connect to scale the decentralized delivery of proven, impactful and cost-effective interventions.

According to the WHO, an estimated 5.2m children under 5 years died from preventable and treatable causes in 2019. Essential preventative interventions for children include routine immunizations, safe water, and adequate nutrition including zinc and Vitamin A supplementation(WHO; Lassi, et. al. 2014). For children 6 months to 5 years, Vitamin A supplements reduce all-cause mortality by 4-13% (Givewell). As the supplements are cheap, safe, cost-effective and scalable, the primary roadblock to significant Vitamin A disbursement is a distribution problem. This holds true for similar child health interventions such as zinc supplementation and mass deworming administration.

“An estimated 240,000–500,000 children who are vitamin A-deficient become blind every year, and half of them die within 12 months of losing their sight. Deficiency of Vitamin A is associated with significant morbidity and mortality from common childhood infections. (WHO)”

The CommCare Connect Child Health Campaign includes delivering Vitamin A and deworming tablets, screening & referral for malnutrition, and an option to include other impactful and localized interventions such as Oral Rehydration, Zinc supplementation, or chatbots with useful information (e.g. nutrition advice).

Frontline Workers and Organizations opt into delivering child health interventions using an application that Dimagi provides, and then paid for the verified delivery of the interventions to their communities. The total cost is to be $2 per child for this campaign. Following an initial trial in India, currently this Child Health Campaign is being piloted in Kenya, Tanzania, and Zambia where we expect to reach 15,000 children.