Amref Health Africa Receives Funding from Eisai to Support COVID-19 Education, Awareness and Training of Community and other Health workers

Nairobi, June 10 2020: Amref Health Africa has received funding from Eisai – a leading global research and development-based pharmaceutical company headquartered in Japan – to support the set-up and implementation of digital education, awareness and training mobile platform LEAP, for health care worker engagement on the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19).

The engagement on information and awareness will be undertaken in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda. It will be rolled out using LEAP, Amref’s mobile learning solution to empower community health care workers and frontline health workers, with accurate COVID-19 information to counter the spread of the virus in Africa.

‘‘In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we have been training numerous health providers on infection prevention and control. LEAP will enable the health workers to educate communities on the virus and relevant prevention measures,’’ noted Dr Githinji Gitahi, Amref Health Africa Group CEO.

Using LEAP, Amref will provide training to health care workers through multilingual key messaging around COVID-19 to help reduce misinformation and disinformation within communities. The health workers will also be informed on how to identify, isolate and refer suspected cases as well as maintain safety standards at points of entry or high-risk areas to prevent possible transmission. 

“Eisai is eager to encourage the provision of COVID-19 information through LEAP technologies to health care professionals and residents in the Sub-Sahara Africa region in partnership with Amref Health Africa. Provision of such information resonates with Eisai’s commitment to develop novel COVID-19 treatments and provide support of aid as well as ensure the stable supply of medicines in accordance with its human healthcare mission,” said Kazumasa Nagayama, Chief Strategy Officer at Eisai.

He added that Eisai has chosen to support the continued implementation of LEAP in Kenya and the development, set-up and implementation in Uganda and Rwanda for its potential to not only provide accurate, up-to-date access to the latest accurate health care information and training for providers and patients but also to rapidly mobilise communities in response to health events such as the current COVID-19 pandemic. 

LEAP employs mobile learning pedagogy to train and empower health workers using their mobile device operating from any phone (basic or smart). This enables them to learn at their own pace and with their own devices while in the community, providing for both the interpersonal and community aspects of learning. Developed through a cross-sector partnership comprising Kenya’s Ministry of Health, Amref Health Africa, Accenture, Safaricom, MPESA Foundation, and Mezzanine, LEAP has delivered training to over 70,000 community health workers in Kenya, improving access to health services for approximately 5 million people.

Following the partnership, it is expected that awareness levels among the public on COVID-19 will be increased through the dissemination of key messages to patients during their routine visits to health centres. At the same time, capacity among health care workers to screen, detect and contain suspected cases of Coronavirus and preparedness and response rate of the health care system will improve significantly.

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NOTES TO EDITORS

About Amref Health Africa

Amref Health Africa, headquartered in Kenya, is the largest Africa based International Non-Governmental Organisation (INGO) currently running programs in over 35 countries in Africa with lessons learnt over 60 years of engagement with governments, communities and partners to increase sustainable health access in Africa. Amref Health Africa also incorporates programme development, fundraising, partnership, advocacy, monitoring and evaluation, and has offices in Europe and North America as well as subsidiaries: Amref Flying Doctors, Amref Enterprises and the Amref International University.

About Eisai Co., Ltd.

Eisai Co., Ltd. is a leading global research and development-based pharmaceutical company headquartered in Japan. We define our corporate mission as “giving first thought to patients and their families and to increasing the benefits health care provides,” which we call our human health care (hhc) philosophy. With approximately 10,000 employees working across our global network of R&D facilities, manufacturing sites and marketing subsidiaries, we strive to realise our hhc philosophy by delivering innovative products to address unmet medical needs, with a particular focus in our strategic areas of Oncology and Neurology. As a global pharmaceutical company, our mission extends to patients around the world through our investment and participation in partnership-based initiatives to improve access to medicines in developing and emerging countries. For further information on Eisai Co., Ltd., visit https://www.eisai.com.

About LEAP

LEAP – the mHealth Platform is a Scalable, Integrated Mobile Learning Solution that offers continuous training opportunities, peer collaboration, real-time evaluation reports and strengthened supervision. LEAP employs mobile learning pedagogy to train and empower health workers using their mobile device operating from any phone (basic or smart). This enables health workers to learn at their own pace and with their own mobile devices while in the community, providing for both the interpersonal and community aspects of learning. LEAP was developed through a cross-sector partnership comprising Kenya’s Ministry of Health, Amref Health Africa, Accenture, Safaricom, MPESA Foundation, and Mezzanine. So far, LEAP has delivered training to over 70,000 community health workers in Kenya, Malawi improving access to health services for approximately 5 million people. It is now scaling to other countries including Ethiopia, Uganda, Malawi and Senegal. 

For more information, contact:          

Elizabeth Ntonjira 

Head of Global Corporate Communications

Amref Health Africa

Elizabeth.ntonjira@amref.org