Healthy Families Project

A cadre of enthusiastic community “agents” and health workers collaborate with Pathfinder to identify barriers to behavior change and the means to overcome them.

Pathfinder is working with the Angolan Ministry of Health, the National Directorate of Public Health, and the Provincial Department of Health Services to strengthen the environment for contraception and family planning as a national health priority.

With funding from USAID, Pathfinder is:

• Supporting the Ministry of Health in development and implementation of a national family planning strategy;
• Supporting the Ministry of Health Reproductive Health Technical Working Group to reposition contraception and family planning; and
• Catalyzing collective action of contraception and family planning stakeholders to advocate for improved contraceptive security.

Pathfinder prepared two situational analysis papers, one on a preliminary framework for the national family planning strategy, and one on contraceptive security, based on discussions with Ministry of Health officials. Key recommendations included broadening the contraceptive menu to include permanent methods; scaling up availability of long-acting methods; integrating family planning services into other services such as maternal and child health and child immunization; establishing reproductive services for youth; and investing in capacity building.

Recommendations for contraceptive security included strengthening the supply chain management system; strengthening the logistics management information system; expanding the social marketing system; and working toward government procurement of contraceptives.

This past July, Pathfinder facilitated the Adolescent Youth Sexual Reproductive Health Learning Exchange Trip, which brought key Angolan stakeholders to visit their counterparts in Ethiopia. In addition to learning about the implementation and design of a national strategy, this trip provided Pathfinder’s Angolan counterparts the opportunity to learn about logistics for the distribution of contraceptive methods to facilities and users, the benefits of applying a national gender strategy to public health activities in Ethiopia, and the experience of implementing an mHealth project.