COVID-19 has overwhelmed health systems worldwide, leading to worrisome drops in essential health services for preventable, yet deadly diseases. Many facilities in Kenya and Uganda are overstretched and understocked, and travel restrictions and fears of leaving home are keeping some from seeking essential preventative, routine and even urgent care. A recent review of government data in Kenya and Uganda revealed up to 35% declines in the number of people who sought facility-based care and treatments for common childhood diseases such as malaria, diarrhea and pneumonia due to COVID-19.

In contrast to these national trends, treatments for these same diseases in our direct operations have nearly doubled in areas where Living Goods supports government CHWs. These CHWs are surpassing expectations on many fronts, supported both by the strong community health platform Living Goods had in place pre-pandemic along with the numerous programmatic adjustments we made in response to it. Household demand for CHW services increased significantly due to the travel-restrictions, fear of facilities and economic hardship brought on by COVID-19, and several of the adjustments we designed were intended to drive more equitable care. CHWs, in turn, were able to fill vital gaps in essential health service delivery and meet the increased demand of neighbor families who felt safer visiting them and motivated by the free services and education CHWs were offering.

Here’s a sampling of the results achieved by CHWs in Living Goods’ direct operations in 2020:

As noted above, families increasingly turned to CHWs for health care during the crisis, both given their increased difficulties and fears around visiting facilities and because Living Goods removed some key barriers to care to ensure health service continuity. Key elements of our COVID-19 response included free essential medicines, a revised CHW compensation structure, remote supervision, and adjusted digital health workflows.