President Samia Suluhu Hassan yesterday launched a system dubbed “M-Mama” that uses a mobile platform to connect pregnant women in rural areas to emergency transport in an effort to reduce maternal deaths.
Funded by Vodacom Tanzania in collaboration with the Ministry of Health, the platform was introduced as a pilot in Shinyanga and Sengerema in 2017 where it helped a total of 12,000 mothers and children and reduced deaths caused by lack of emergency transport.
Speaking during the launch in Dodoma yesterday, President Hassan said the platform was complimenting a 2017 government campaign known as “Jiongeze Tuwavushe Salama” which focused on a similar issue of reducing maternal deaths.
“The comfort I have today is to see this system we are launching today has gone to pilot and has produced positive results to save the lives of pregnant women and their babies, but also I heard processes are underway under the cooperation of the Ministry of Health and Vodacom to design a system that will track drugs from the manufacturer to the end users,” she said.
The Heald of State said after the official launch the service would now be rolled out in 14 regions under Vodacom funding. Ms Hassan added that in Africa there were challenges and shortcomings in the health sector which are related to quality of availability of services and to manage so dealing with it there is a need for public private partnership like what has been done by Vodacom.
However, to support what has been done by the telco, Ms Hassan said the government has bought 233 ordinary ambulances that are expected to be deployed across Tanzania while another 25 with referral status are also expected to arrive.
Source: thecitizen.co.tz
