Release: UNC receives Gates Foundation grant to help tackle reproductive health issues facing urban poor
Mar 30, 2009
UNC receives Gates Foundation grant to help tackle reproductive health issues facing urban poor
Issued by UNC News Services (March 30, 2009):
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/health-and-medicine/unc-receives-gates-foundation-grant-to-help-tackle-reproductive-health-issues-facing-urban-poor.html
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has received more than
$22 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for a new
project that aims to improve the reproductive health of the urban poor
in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
The project,
Measurement, Learning and Evaluation for the Urban Reproductive Health
Initiative, will be run by UNC's Carolina Population Center. Working
with the center on the project are the African Population and Health
Research Center, based in Nairobi, Kenya, and the Population Reference
Bureau in Washington, D.C.
With the ranks of the world's urban
poor growing, so, too, is the need for services addressing maternal and
infant mortality, family planning and other such issues often faced by
people living in poverty. In 2008, for the first time ever, the urban
share of the world's population reached 50 percent and researchers
predict nearly all future global population growth will occur in towns
and cities in developing countries. In particular, urban populations in
Africa and Asia are expected to double between 2000 and 2030.
The
Measurement, Learning and Evaluation (MLE) project will help identify
which urban reproductive health approaches and interventions are most
effective and likely to have the biggest impact. Two Carolina
Population Center fellows are heading the project. David Guilkey,
Ph.D., Cary C. Boshamer Distinguished Professor of Economics in the UNC
College of Arts and Sciences, is the principal investigator and project
director. Ilene Speizer, Ph.D., research associate professor in the
department of maternal and child health in the UNC Gillings School of
Global Public Health, is co-principal investigator and technical deputy
director.
"It is exciting that the MLE project is being
undertaken in parallel with the design and development of the
foundation's programs," Guilkey said. "This permits the project to
identify which approaches are the most effective for the urban poor and
shape future family planning and reproductive health programs for
ministries of health, municipal governments, donors and foundations
serving the poor in Sub-Saharan African and South Asia."
"People
living in urban slums have the least access to sanitation and health
services, including family planning and reproductive health programs"
said Dr. Bitra George, country director for Family Health International
in India, which is responsible for the Gates-funded Urban Reproductive
Health Initiative in India, located in the state of Uttar Pradesh and
other areas. "The MLE project will partner with the foundation's
initiative to determine how to improve the quality and accessibility of
family planning and reproductive health services for the most
vulnerable urban poor."
Working with health-care providers and
researchers in several countries in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa,
the project will focus on three main tasks:
- serving as the central technical resource for local efforts to monitor and evaluate programs in countries where the foundation is supporting urban reproductive health initiatives.
- identifying and documenting evidence-based interventions and best practices for providing health services to the urban poor, and sharing information globally about promising approaches with policy makers, program managers and researchers.
- building the skills and professional capacity of countries and regions to undertake rigorous measurement and evaluation of population, family planning and integrated reproductive health activities targeted at poor and vulnerable urban populations.
The grant runs for six years. In the first year, researchers will focus on getting the project off the ground in India and on developing tools for the wider project as it expands.
NOTE: David Guilkey can be reached at (919) 966-1733 or david_guilkey@unc.edu.
Ilene Speizer can be reached at (919) 966-7411 or ilene_speizer@unc.edu.
Carolina Population Center contact: Lori Delaney, (919) 966-4562, lori_delaney@unc.edu
News Services contact: Patric Lane, (919) 962-8596, patric_lane@unc.edu
