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MEDIA CENTER Population Council President Visits Africa to View Council's Research and Meet African Officials NEW YORK (8 July 2003) — Population Council president Linda G. Martin returned from a three-week trip to sub-Saharan Africa, where she met with researchers and top officials, including Ghana's president and Kenya's minister for health. The visit—on which she was accompanied by Peter Donaldson, Council vice president and director of its International Programs Division, and Ayorinde Ajayi, regional director for sub-Saharan Africa—included stops in Ghana, South Africa, and Kenya. The goal of the trip was to review some of the Council's ongoing efforts to provide scientific evidence that can be used as the basis for cost-effective policies and programs to improve the well-being and health of people in the poorest countries in the world.
During the week of 9 June, Martin was joined in Ghana by the chairman of the Council's board, Rodney B. Wagner. A highlight of the Ghana leg of the journey was a meeting with His Excellency John A. Kufuor, president of the country. The visit, which was reported in an article and photograph on the front page of The Ghanaian Times, provided the opportunity for Wagner and Martin to thank President Kufuor for his support of the Population Council in the past year. (In 2002, the Council consolidated its regional headquarters in Accra, the capital of Ghana. Previously, activities of the Council's seven offices in sub-Saharan Africa had been managed from Dakar, Senegal, and Nairobi, Kenya.) President Kufuor thanked the Council on behalf of the people of Ghana and assured them, according to The Times, "that the government would do everything possible to make the council's operations in Ghana smooth."
While in Ghana, the delegation also visited the Volta Region, on the border with Togo, to meet with government officials and community health workers in the Nkwanta District. Leaders from the Council and WorldVision, a faith-based organization working with the world's poorest children and families, dedicated the Azua Community Health Center. WorldVision provided physical resources to build the health center, and Council researchers were key partners in designing the package of services dedicated to improving maternal and child health care. The Nkwanta project is part of the Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) initiative that is being scaled up nationwide in Ghana. This program grew out of studies the Council conducted over the last decade at the Navrongo Health Research Centre, a Ministry of Health research station in northern Ghana, with support from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and several private foundations. (Click here for additional information about Navrongo.) The next stop was South Africa, where the Population Council, with support from USAID and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will conduct Phase III effectiveness trials of a microbicide to prevent the sexual transmission of HIV. (Click here for additional information about microbicides.) It is estimated that over one-fifth of the 15–49-year-old population in South Africa is HIV-positive. During the week of 16 June, Martin visited research collaborators at the University of Cape Town and visited the clinic in one of the surrounding townships where women will participate in the trial and receive medical care. Along with Nono Simelela, chief director of the HIV/AIDS Directorate of the National Department of Health, Martin officially dedicated a clinic in Soshanguve township near Pretoria. The clinic will be the site of the arm of the Council's microbicide clinical trial that is being conducted by the Medical University of Southern Africa. In Kenya, the delegation had the opportunity to visit a project aimed at improving the abilities of young people who have not benefited from a full education to earn a decent living. The project is being implemented by K-Rep, the Kenyan micro-credit financing organization, and is being evaluated by Population Council researchers. It focuses on girls and boys ages 16–22 in the Nairobi slum of Eastlands. In Kenya, 44 percent of the population is under the age of 15, and opportunities are quite limited for most. The final highlight of the trip was a meeting with the Honorable Charity K. Ngilu, Kenya's minister for health. She thanked the Council for its 30 years of research in Kenya and discussed ways in which the Council can continue to assist Kenya's government and people. Of particular interest is the plan to scale up to the national level a program to reduce maternal mortality that the Council, with support from the U.K. Department for International Development, has been evaluating in Western Kenya.
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