The Institute of International Education and the Maternal Health Task Force at Harvard School of Public Health are pleased to announce the 2013 Maternal Health Young Champions!
Mr. Ashiru Adamu Abubakar
Country: Nigeria
Mentor: Mr. Umar Farouk Wada, Health Education Initiative for Women
Maternal Health Focus: Main causes of maternal mortality in Northern Nigeria
Background: Mr. Ashiru Abubakar is a medical practitioner focusing on obstetrics. Recognizing the role of obstetric hemorrhages in many maternal deaths, Ashiru pushed for an unprecedented blood donation campaign for the maternity unit of the Murtala Muhammad Specialist Hospital Kano. This campaign has so far yielded over 200 donated pints of blood – one of the highest in the country. As a voluntary blood donor himself, he has helped to dispel some of the misconception in the region towards blood donations. He also participated in drafting a protocol to tackle the rising incidences of child sexual abuse.
Ashiru's blogs detail his journey in the program and his quest for the improvement of maternal care by improving provider attitudes. He has finished writing his proposal and is in the final stages of compilation. He was co-awarded the “MamaYe’ award for leadership in maternal care. Ashiru’s journeys took him deep into rural Jigawa where he had the distinction of having a baby named after him as a tribute to the first baby in the village delivered by a doctor. Ashiru's mentor organization works in 44 communities, 14 of them include activities related to Ashiru's research on the attitude of health care workers; hence, he visits at least two health facilities in two different communities daily.
Mr. Solomon Abebe Addis
Country: Ethiopia
Mentor: Dr. Dereje Negussie, Engender Health Ethiopia
Maternal Health Focus: Institutional delivery
Background: Mr. Solomon Abebe Addis has a MS in Social Development Management, a degree in Sociology and Social Anthropology and certificate in Management Development. He has experience working with the government and local NGOs, mostly on youth-related projects. He has a multi-dimensional approach to maternal health and reproductive health issues. Solomon is a believer in networking and connects to society through the various forums and clubs that he manages. He is the founder of Millennium Youth Coalition, an organization that facilitates trainings, workshops, campaigns, and provided health access for rural girls. At his current job, he established a large HIV Network in Ethiopia that comprises more than 800 health organizations which succeeded in providing referral health service for 25,000 destitute HIV positive mothers. Solomon is a strong social media user and discusses maternal health issues on Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and contributes to Alliance Newsletter.
Solomon's research is ‘Exploring the Integration of Family Planning Service with Anti-Retroviral Therapy Service in Addis Ababa.’ He has gained in-depth knowledge about maternal health and family planning from his mentor, documents at EngenderHealth, and global online courses. Solomon assisted EngenderHealth Ethiopia to develop report collection templates for regional offices and initiated the publication of the organization's biannual newsletter. Currently, he is also working on the set-up of the first ever Ethiopian national toll-free telephone service to provide holistic maternal health service for HIV positive mothers.
Ms. Vasudha Chakravarthy
Country: India
Mentor: Dr. Pushpa Tiwari, Tata Steel Family Initiatives Foundation
Maternal Health Focus: Research and evaluation studies
Background: Ms. Vasudha Chakravarthy has a Master’s degree in Public Health and experience in conducting research and evaluation studies. Vasudha has analyzed data to support maternal and child health interventions in several states in India. At her current job at TRIOs Development Support, Vasudha coordinated a study on adolescent reproductive and sexual health and rights across multiple states. She has experience in undertaking field based studies and managing large data sets and has been exposed to a variety of perspectives on reproductive and maternal health issues.
Vasudha is at present engaged in a variety of activities and is benefiting from exposure to the community and time spent with the medical teams providing clinical services both as fixed and out-reach services. She is proposing to examine the rationality of access to services, aspects that influence decisions on accessing health services by pregnant women and mothers in the region.
Ms. Priya John
Country: India
Mentor: Professor Nutan Jain, Indian Institute of Health Management Research
Maternal Health Focus: Maternal Deaths and Field Work in Jharkhand
Background: Ms. Priya John has a Master’s degree in Gender and Development and Social Work and has been working on public health issues for several years. As part of a funding agency focusing on health and nutrition, she worked extensively in Jharkhand with agencies and individuals working on maternal health concerns. Her area of focus was the network formed for delivery of services through the public health system. Priya worked with a local team in rural Jharkhand to systematically document maternal deaths; these cases were shared at different platforms with varied stakeholders. She hopes to conduct further research on the accessibility and availability of maternal healthcare for indigenous populations in hard-to-reach area. She continues to work for access to care through Pehal, based in Jharkhand.
Priya came into the MHYC program with a clear vision of her research focus. She has developed a concept note and research methodology, which has been approved by the host institution’s ethics review board. She will go to Jharkhand for an extended period of time to conduct field research on accessibility to maternal health care in a Paharia and Santhal village in Jharkhand.
Mr. Anteneh Asefa Mekonnen
Country: Ethiopia
Mentor: Dr. Delayehu Bekele, Saint Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College
Maternal Health Focus: Improvement of institutional delivery
Background: Mr. Anteneh Asefa Mekonnen has a MPH and BSc in Nursing. He has several responsibilities in his position at Hawassa University School of Public and Environmental Health as lecturer and health care management module coordinator and formerly served as assistant dean of health science faculty at another government university. He is an author and a co-author of eight research activities contributing to the health sector. He has also served as a part-time consultant for the Ministry of Health, Regional Health Bureaus, and NGOs. He has conducted training of trainers on maternal, newborn, and child health and the PMTCT services. In addition to several other reproductive health based trainings.
As a Young Champion, Anteneh hopes to explore how to improve the institutional delivery service in southern Ethiopia.
Ms. Oluwadamilola Olufunbi Olaogun
Country: Nigeria
Mentor: Professor Oladele Akogun, Common Heritage Foundation
Maternal Health Focus: Maternal health services and socio-cultural barriers
Background: Ms. Oluwadamilola Olaogun has a medical degree from the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria and a Masters of Public Health (MPH) from the University of Leeds, United Kingdom. She is passionate about issues related to maternal and child health. During her service year, Oluwadamilola initiated the inclusion of health promotion and volunteered as a health instructor in a skills acquisition community development project called “Girl Child Education Initiative.” Oluwadamilola worked with the Midwives Service Scheme team on the state of readiness assessment for the condition cash transfer pilot project. She also gives technical assistant for research development in PHI.
Oluwadamilola is developing a module which could be used to train midwives on attitude-related issues and the government of Nigeria has already declaring interest in it. She is conducting fieldwork and reserach to support the model.
Ms. Luz Maria Soto Pizano
Country: Mexico
Mentor: Dr. Rosario Cardenas, Observatorio de Motalidad Materna
Maternal Health Focus: Maternal Health Field Work in Chiapas
Background: Ms. Luz Maria Soto Pizanohas a medical degree from Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana in Mexico City and is currently earning a Master’s Degree in Rural Development. She has worked on maternal health issues for several organizations and has volunteered in Mexico and Haiti. Luz Maria is passionate about her job; she is concerned about the wellbeing of the community she is working in and open to enhance her abilities and knowledge to improve her professional capabilities. Currently, she works as a coordinator at Casa de la Mujer in Chiapas and has improved the results of the organization’s work.
Luz Maria's work in Mexico is focused in the field. She has been traveling in remote and underserved areas to support the work of her host institution. She has already built a relationship with some of the indigenous communities she will be working with throughout her program. Infrastructure is not well established in many of these areas and communication services are not available. Internet, telephone, and, in some cases, electricity are not common in these towns.
Ms. Neha Rathi
Country: India
Mentor: Dr. Wasundhara Joshi, Society for Nutrition, Education, and Health Action
Maternal Health Focus: Human & reproductive rights law
Background: Ms. Neha Rathi has a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Mass Communications, a law degree from the University of Delhi, and a Master of Laws in International Human Rights from the London School of Economics. At the Human Rights Law Network, she worked on two cases that resulted in the award of compensation to victims of reproductive rights violations for the first time and assisted on the landmark reproductive rights case of Laxmi Mandal vs. Deen Dayal Hari Nager Hospital & Ors. In the past year Neha has conducted legal research on Justifiability of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights; Law of Self-Determination and Secession; and Poverty as Violation of Human Rights. She has published articles on reproductive rights in The Asian Age, Asian News International, Sahara Time, and Hard News Magazine.
Neha is working on a comparative study of women's role in decision making in abortion in urban and rural areas of Maharashtra, a project related to the organization’s work and in-line with her experience and interest.
Ms. Chinomnso Ibe Traffina
Country: Nigeria
Mentor: Dr. Emeka Nwachukwu, E&F Management Consult
Maternal Health Focus: Male involvement; community advocates
Background: Ms. Chinomnso Traffina specializes in nursing, is a certified midwife, and is working towards an Advanced Masters in Public Health. She has worked at the Institute of Human Virology Nigeria for over two years, where she coordinated the Global Fund ATM and health system project. She currently works for the Traffina Foundation for Community Health, which she founded in 2007. She has experience working on programs for maternal/child health and father care projects in Eastern and Northern Nigeria. Included among these projects is the award-winning “Let’s Save Our Mothers” program. Chinomnso first became interested in maternal health as a student at the Midwifery Training School.
Chinomso has been prolific in her field work. She has visited many villages in preparation for her research on community involvement in maternal health. She is also a co-recipient for the “MamaYe” award. Chinomso was invited by the IDEAS team of the London school of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine to meet with the them at their learning workshop and find ways to collaborate on their project in Nigeria.
Ms. Mahlet Atakilt Woldetsadik
Country: Ethiopia
Mentor: Mr. Mekonnen Degu, Family Guidance Association of Ethiopia
Maternal Health Focus: Prevention of maternal deaths
Background: Ms. Mahlet Atakilt Woldetsadik has a MPH from Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Santé Publique, a Bachelor of Science, and a Bachelor of Arts from Converse College. She has experience working on community based projects across various cultures, including conducting focus group discussions in reproductive health issues in rural areas of Ethiopia and designing health oriented development projects and capacitating women in Rajasthan, India. As part of her master’s thesis, she designed and implemented a qualitative research project to study the provision of medico-legal services to survivors of sexual violence. Mahlet recently completed a fellowship at Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Santé Publique, France where she was part of a team that conceptualized a research project based on the major noncommunicable diseases causing premature death and disability in the European population. She was editor-in-chief of the Public Health International Network (PHIN) newsletter from 2010-2011 in Paris, France.
Mahlet and her mentor have designed, and are currently conducting, a study that explores the various co-factors that put women at an increased risk for unsafe abortion, the major cause of maternal mortality in Ethiopia. In addition, Mahlet mentors and teaches English to youth at FGAE’s youth center in Hawassa and surrounding communities.