Figure: WHO/G. Tapper

WHO 13 July 2017 – In the Tanganyika province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, going to a health centre often means traveling long distances over poor roads, while carrying a sick child and supplies. WHO’s Rapid Access Expansion Programme (RAcE) is bringing diagnosis and treatment for malaria, pneumonia, and diarrhoea – the three deadliest childhood diseases – into remote communities.

The tears have stopped in Tanganyika Province. In one of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) newest provinces, the Rapid Access Expansion (RAcE) Programme has turned the table on a trio of maladies that cause 42% of deaths in children under the age of 5: malaria, pneumonia and diarrhoea. Agricultural workers returning from the fields to their communities say they no longer hear nightly mourning cries. Instead, children play raucously, passing the community health worker’s hut, taunting each other with tales of pin-pricks in case of misbehaviour.

Village leaders credit the contribution of community health workers, known as relais communautaires, who are the foundation of RAcE’s success in bringing desperately needed treatment for diseases that can kill young children rapidly.

The people of Tanganyika Province live in remote areas where access to healthcare is challenging due to lack of transportation, natural and physical barriers, and poverty. Deeply-rutted mountainous dirt roads, thick with dust in the dry season and treacherously slippery in the half-yearly rainy season are difficult to navigate not only for people travelling by foot, but also for ‘taxis’ – bicycles and mopeds with passengers perched precariously on the backs.

Families are poor, subsisting on what they can eke from the fields, with little or no funds to spare on treatment in health centres. And there are other obstacles. In some cases, the only routes require passing through areas with wild animals like leopards or lions, or through crocodile-infested rivers.

See: http://www.who.int/malaria/areas/rapid_access_expansion_2015/features/access-health-care-drc/en/