Uganda, infant mortality: an “empty pumpkin” to fight it: thousands of newborns saved

KAMPALA – “I received Kokono when I was eight months pregnant and even now that my son is six months old I still use it”, Vanessa Nabasyrie pronounces this sentence with an enthusiastic smile and one could say that she is talking about nothing but a cradle named Kokono, in the local language “empty pumpkin”. But if you are a mother of Kavempe, one of the districts of the Ugandan capital Kampala, everything changes. That cradle can really be a lot and even more: an unbroken life.

The data. In sub-Saharan Africa, and Uganda is no exception, the infant mortality rate is the highest in the world: 56% of under-five deaths globally. On the other hand, 29% of the world’s population is born here (UN report 2022). In short, if you were born here and you are less than five years old, the probability of dying is 15 times higher than if you were born in Europe or North America. Every day Uganda sees about 2,500 of its children die due to various factors: infectious disease with malaria in the first place, domestic accidents due to the absence of specific shelters for newborns, attacks by insects, reptiles and rodents and last but not least cases of co-sleeping, because if it is true that everyone remembers their first sleeps with their mother with pleasure, it is also true that the surface on which one sleeps is not adequately rigid, the risk of suffocation is not so remote.

The project. But if a multifunctional “empty gourd”, resistant like traditional but biodegradable plastic, can protect the child from mosquitoes up to one year of age, keeps him safe while working or doing household chores, does not allow reptiles and rodents to get closer and assures him that he can sleep peacefully next to the adults, something can change. Especially if this new type of cradle was designed by 200 mothers and potential mothers who are forced to deal with these problems every day.

The involvement of 4 districts. Kokono was born, in fact, with the involvement of 4 Ugandan districts from an idea of ​​the Italian De-LAB, a benefit corporation, which together with the non-governmental organization Amref Health Africa, widely present in Uganda, which was entrusted both the involvement of the beneficiaries and the awareness-raising activity towards associations, hospitals and UN agencies – who can purchase cradles in large quantities to then use them locally – and towards the final users, Ugandan families, who can find cradles at extremely accessible in various shops in Kampala, online in the Jumia marketplace or through the all-female distribution network born from the collateral Edu-KO training and job placement project to ensure the presence and diffusion of Kokono in the many villages.

The results. The ambitious project, which also for practical implementation embraced the Ugandan strategy “Buy Ugandan, Build Uganda” by producing the cradles directly on site, was financed in 2022 as part of the Coopen path, a financing path promoted among others from Innovation for Development e Company of San Paolo Foundation, but now stands on its own and aims to be able to expand distribution from Kampala to the most remote areas of the country. A difficult but not impossible challenge, given that there are already 700 cradles produced and distributed between April 2022 and January 2023.