TANZANIA has registered significant milestones in reducing maternal and newborn deaths, thanks to the use of modern technology.
For starters, over 25,000 lives of expectant mothers have been saved since the launch of M-Mama, an affordable emergency transport service that is connecting mothers and newborns to vital life-saving healthcare in the country’s rural areas.
Such makes Tanzania the only African country so far that has excelled in the provision of such service, with Kenya mulling over plans of rolling it out.
Speaking here on Thursday, Vice-President Philip Mpango described the feat Tanzania’s urgency in reducing maternal and neonatal deaths.
Dr Mpango, was speaking when he visited the M-Mama unit at Mt Meru Referral Hospital, reiterating Tanzania’s commitment in achieving Sustainable Development Goal, number 3.1, which focuses on reducing global Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) to less than 70 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births by 2030.
“Such statistics speak for themselves and is clear impact on the kind of impact M-Mama service has had, since its launch last year,” the VP observed.
To ensure the country stays on track of the goal, Dr Mpango challenged those in charge of the service to make it readily available to expectant mothers at all times.
“Those charged with handling the unit should ensure its hotline is always available and more women are sensitised on it,” the VP insisted.
Dr Mpango also had a piece of advice to community drivers chauffeuring expectant mothers to health centres to handle them with dignity.
Since its launch last year, the service has gone live in 16 regions in the mainland and five in the lsles.
In Arusha along, the M-Mama service has attended to 607 emergencies since it commenced in April this year.
The system creates a network of local taxi drivers to act as ‘taxi ambulances’, in areas where ambulances are rarely available.
With detailed referral plans for every clinic and village, the system provides critical management of emergency transport.
While weak health systems and delayed access to healthcare are said to be significant causes of maternal and newborn deaths, with the lack of affordable transport for emergency referrals a significant driver of poor outcomes, the M-Mama programme connects pregnant women to care when they need it the most, and so reduce maternal deaths, identified as the number one health challenge by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), by as much as 38 per cent.
Earlier on, United States Agency for International Development (USAID) administrator Samantha Power heaped praise on President Samia Suluhu Hassan for putting the lives of women and children at the center of country’s agenda.
“The results speak for themselves. I just got to see a demonstration along with the vice presidents and the ministers gathered here,” she explained.
According to Ms Power, what Tanzania has achieved is worth emulated not only in the country, but the world over.
“Yesterday, I talked about this modern technology with President Ruto (William) and they want to take it up as well,” she added.
Through the noble arrangement, Vodacom Tanzania Foundation foots around 15 million US dollars (about 35bn/-), and 5million US dollars (about 12bn/-) by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) the government of Tanzania, through the Health Ministry provides qualified medical personnel in saving the expectant mothers.
Others partners implementing the project include Touch Foundation and Pathfinder International.
