What impact has UVP had in Uganda?
Over the past decade we have reached thousands of members of rural eastern Ugandan communities with our public health programs. Uganda Village Project has worked in 24 Healthy Villages, implementing grassroots public health solutions and training Village Health Teams to be community-level partners for healthy behavior change. We use monitoring and evaluation tools to track program success and guide evolution. Since the Healthy Villages program was implemented, Uganda Village Project has:

  1. facilitated repair surgeries for more than 220 women with obstetric fistula
  2. distributed nearly 6,000 insecticide-treated mosquito nets
  3. overseen construction of 2,510 tippy tap hand washing stations
  4. provided contraceptives to help 1,571 women control their family size and educated an additional 1,261 women about safe motherhood and family planning
  5. tested almost 7,000 for HIV and supported them with counseling and referrals to services
  6. built more than 60 shallow wells to provide more than 3,500 households with safe water
What local organizations does UVP work with?
Uganda Village Project works closely with local government and community-based organizations to ensure that the structures are in place to keep the projects going after we leave. We have strong relationships with the District Water Office, the District Health Office, and other government officials—in fact, the District Water Office provides all of the parts needed to build shallow wells. We also work in partnership with local organizations to implement activities. These include a community group called St. Mary’s that does HIV/AIDS testing, a local drama group that teaches about health topics, and others.
How are Village Health Teams selected?
Village Health Teams are part of the Ugandan government health care system. In some villages, the members of Village Health Teams are already chosen and have already started working before we start supporting their activities. In other villages, we hold community meetings to elect the Village Health Team members. Community members nominate people, and then everyone votes on five members to lead health projects in the village.
How can I get involved with UVP?
Although all of our work is in Uganda, there are still ways to get involved. We run a summer internship program for undergrad and graduate students interested in public health and international development. We can also use volunteers to help with our nonprofit operations—from web design to accounting to human resources. If you’d like to find out more about how how to get involved, please email our Executive Director at [email protected].

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Improve health in rural Uganda

Uganda Village Project operates within the Iganga District of Uganda, a densely populated area that is one of the poorest districts in the country. Villages in Iganga suffer from low access to health care, marginal or non-existent preventative health education, and lack of clean water sources.

As a result, people are frequently sick: malaria and gastro-intestinal disorders such as diarrhea are the leading causes of death for children under five, and the risk of maternal mortality is nearly forty times higher than in the United States. Uganda Village Project was founded in response to this as an effort to bring sustainable public health interventions to the rural communities of Iganga.

Thanks to the support of donors from around the world, Uganda Village Project is able to reach thousands of rural villagers each year with access to health services, educational sessions about staying healthy, and resources for prevention of disease.

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Support Uganda Village Project

Your donation will support health programming in Iganga District. This could be the purchase of mosquito nets to prevent malaria, holding an HIV outreach to educate and test community members, or sending a nurse to villages every quarter to provide family planning methods to women who otherwise have little access to contraceptives. Thanks to your support, Uganda Village Project can provide the education and tools that villagers need to stay healthy. 

About Uganda Village Project

Since 2003, Uganda Village Project has been working with the people of Iganga to promote public health and sustainable development in the rural communities of this marginalized district in southeast Uganda. We work at a village-by-village level to address the most pressing healthcare concerns of each community, including malaria, HIV and STIs, household sanitation and hygiene, family planning access, obstetric fistula awareness and repair, and provision of clean water through shallow wells.

Uganda Village Project trains locally-elected volunteers called Village Health Teams (VHTs), and then works in partnerships with the VHTs, community-based organizations, and local government to educate and encourage healthy changes in each of the villages where we work. Our flagship effort is our “Healthy Villages” program, a village-by-village system that addresses the most pressing healthcare concerns of each community, including prevention of malaria, education and testing of HIV and STIs, improved household sanitation and hygiene, and access to family planning services. We also work with obstetric fistula awareness and repair and provision of clean water through shallow wells.