Burkina’s Women Learn to Fight Malaria Through Loans

For years, Clarisse Tangkwano had no idea mosquitoes spread malaria.

All she did know was that fevers, nausea and headaches regularly gripped her family. But since a credit agency taught Tangkwano how malaria spreads, the mother of four has bought a mosquito net. Tangkwano initially wanted to borrow money just for books and other school supplies for her children. She added the net to her list after the Federation des Caisses Populaires du Burkina Fas (FCPB) taught her how it could protect her and her family from the mosquito’s paradise that is the suburbs outside the capital Ouagadougou where they live. “I bought the mosquito net so that I could protect us from the problem of malaria,” she said while breastfeeding her baby son. “Since we bought the net we haven’t had it.” Africa’s battle against the mosquito-borne disease, which kills a child on the continent every 30 seconds, was highlighted last month at the Davos economic forum. Actress Sharon Stone raised $1 million in five minutes from business tycoons to buy bed nets while Britain said it would donate $85 million. African musicians including Youssou N’Dour said they would plan a Live Aid-style concert. Worldwide health authorities estimate the disease kills between 1 million and 3 million people every year, most of them African children under 5. It is spread by a bite from the female Anopheles mosquito, which requires blood to nurture her eggs.Many have described it as Africa’s silent tsunami, claiming as many victims as last December’s deadly tidal wave in Asia every couple of months. A world away from the Davos ski slopes in dusty Burkina Faso, it’s getting the message across, not money, that is proving key. To spread that message, the FCPB agency has been targeting female clients with their “credit with education” program. “It’s the woman who manages the family, who remembers the fundamental needs of the family,” said Celestine Toe, the program’s manager. “There’s even a saying here that says ‘the woman is the source’.” The program offers small loans to women in return for attendance at weekly classes that teach business skills and health care. U.S.-based Freedom from Hunger, which backs the program, started the malaria initiative in 2002. The average size of the credit union’s loans is $49. Despite that small amount, since starting out the agency has already distributed some $17 million worth of loans and claims a 99 percent repayment rate, which has made it a financially sustainable operation. Every week, the women gather to make their repayments. Then, often under the shade of a large village tree attend their weekly classes. Agency representatives teach them there, among other things, how to administer anti-malarial drugs to children, how to recognize those at risk from malaria and what the disease’s early stages are. The FCBP and Freedom from Hunger partnership offers their 53,000 female clients bed nets for $4 — about half the market price. Experts agree the insecticide-treated meshes can be a very effective preventative measure because most malaria-carrying mosquitoes bite at night. They believe nets can reduce mortality rates for children by up to 20 percent. “The best preventive measure that we have today in the world is insecticide-treated bed nets,” said Dr. Robert David, Freedom from Hunger’s vice president. “Unfortunately here in West Africa the use of bed nets in general or insecticide-treated bed nets specifically is very, very low,” David said on a trip to Ouagadougou. Awareness campaigns can hopefully change that, believes Toe. Tangkwano’s life, for one, has already been touched. “With the loan, I’ve been able to solve a lot of problems — like all the ones I had with my children,” she said. “I am now able to send them to school and buy them things.” (Source: Reuters Health, February 2005)