Access Project

Last updated
The Access Project
Founded2002
TypePublic Health Non-profit
Location
Area served
Rwanda
Key people
Josh Ruxin, Jeffrey Sachs
Website www.theaccessproject.com

The Access Project is a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the quality and accessibility of health care in Rwanda. Founded in 2002 by public health expert Josh Ruxin and economist Jeffrey Sachs, the organization provides technical and operational assistance to improve the management capacity of rural health centers, [1] with a focus on maternal and child health.

Contents

Columbia University's Earth Institute initiative[ clarification needed ] also builds new health centers in partnership with the Rwanda Ministry of Health (MOH) and led the country's first neglected tropical diseases (NTD) control program. [2]

Approach

The Access Project's approach is to apply private sector principles to the management of health centers across Rwanda. Through hands-on trainings and support, the organization seeks to make health centers efficient, accountable, and self-sustaining. [3] Interventions focus on eight "management domains," from planning and coordination to drug procurement and financial management. [4] In places where infrastructure does not exist or is beyond repair, Access works with the MOH to build new health centers. Together with the MOH, Access has built six health centers in Gashora, Gataraga, Kintobo, Juru, Ngeruka, and Nyarugenge. [5]

Funders

Seed funded by Rob Glaser, the CEO of Real Networks and a former Microsoft executive, and his Glaser Progress Foundation, the Access Project has also received funding from the GE Foundation, the MAC AIDS Fund, and the Schmidt Family Foundation. In addition, Access has been funded by Pfizer, the MAIA Foundation, the Legatum Foundation, and the Garth Brooks Teammates for Kids Foundation. [6]

Related Research Articles

Jeffrey Sachs American economist

Jeffrey David Sachs is an American economist, academic, public policy analyst and former director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University, where he holds the title of University Professor. He is known as one of the world's leading experts on sustainable development, economic development, and the fight against poverty.

Robert Denis Glaser is the founder of RealNetworks, which produces RealAudio, RealVideo, RealPlayer, and Helix, among other products and services. Before founding RealNetworks, he had become a millionaire by working for Microsoft for ten years.

Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation

The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to preventing pediatric HIV infection and eliminating pediatric AIDS through research, advocacy, and prevention and treatment programs. Founded in 1988, the organization works in 12 countries around the world.

Internews

Internews Network, now Internews, is an international non-profit organization.

Mark R. Dybul American diplomat

Mark R. Dybul is an American diplomat, physician and medical researcher. He served as the executive director of The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria from 2012 until 2017.

AED (non-profit)

AED, formerly the Academy for Educational Development (1961-2011), was a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that focused on education, health and economic development for the "least advantaged in the United States and developing countries throughout the world." AED operated more than 250 programs in the United States and in 150 other countries around the world.

The Millennium Villages Project (MVP) was a demonstration project of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, the United Nations Development Programme, and Millennium Promise aimed at proving that its integrated approach to rural development can be used to achieve the Millennium Development Goals—eight globally endorsed targets that address the problems of poverty, health, gender equality, and disease—by 2015.

HIV/AIDS in Rwanda

Rwanda faces a generalized epidemic, with an HIV prevalence rate of 3.1 percent among adults ages 15 to 49. The prevalence rate has remained relatively stable, with an overall decline since the late 1990s, partly due to improved HIV surveillance methodology. In general, HIV prevalence is higher in urban areas than in rural areas, and women are at higher risk of HIV infection than men. Young women ages 15 to 24 are twice as likely to be infected with HIV as young men in the same age group. Populations at higher risk of HIV infection include people in prostitution and men attending clinics for sexually transmitted infections.

Cases of HIV/AIDS in Peru are considered to have reached the level of a concentrated epidemic. According to a population-based survey conducted in Peru’s 24 largest cities in 2002, adult HIV prevalence was estimated to be less than 1 percent. The survey demonstrated that cases are unevenly distributed in the country, affecting mostly young people between the ages of 25 and 34. As of July 2010, the cumulative reported number of persons infected with HIV was 41,638, and there were 26,566 cases of AIDS, according to the Ministry of Health (MOH), and the male/female ratio for AIDS diagnoses in 2009 was 3.02 to 1. The Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) estimates 76,000 Peruvians are HIV-positive, meaning that many people at risk do not know their status. There were 3,300 deaths due to AIDS in Peru in 2007, down from 5,600 deaths in 2005.

Sonal R. Shah, is an American economist, former lobbyist, and public official. She served as the National Policy Director for Mayor Pete Buttigieg's run in the 2020 United States presidential election. From April 2009 to August 2011, she served as the Director of the Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation in the White House.

The quality of health in Cambodia is rising along with its growing economy. The public health care system has a high priority from the Cambodian government and with international help and assistance, Cambodia has seen some major and continuous improvements in the health profile of its population since the 1980s, with a steadily rising life expectancy.

Gardens for Health International (GHI) is an American 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that seeks to provide sustainable agricultural solutions to chronic childhood malnutrition. GHI partners with rural health centers in Rwanda to equip families with the seeds, skills, and support necessary to shift the paradigm of food aid from dependency to prevention and self-sufficiency.

Community Builders Group is the founding member of a group of humanitarian organizations operating in Burundi, Canada, DR Congo, Haiti, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. The network is known for supporting indigenous groups attempting to find their own natural pathways to self-sufficiency and wellness through bottom-up community initiatives.

AcademyHealth is a nonpartisan, nonprofit professional organization dedicated to advancing the fields of health services research and health policy. It is a professional organization for health services researchers, health policy analysts, and health practitioners, and it is a nonpartisan source for health research and policy. The organization was founded in 2000, in a merger between the Alpha Center and the Association for Health Services Research (AHSR). In 2008, the organization had approximately 4000 health services researcher members.

Agnes Binagwaho Rwandan pediatrician

Agnes Binagwaho is a Rwandan pediatrician and currently the vice chancellor of the University of Global Health Equity. In 1996, she moved back to Rwanda where she provided clinical care in the public sector as well as held a number of project management, health system strengthening, and government positions, including Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health of Rwanda from October 2008 until May 2011 and Minister of Health from May 2011 until July 2016. Currently, since 2016 she works as a Professor of the Practice of Global Health Delivery and since 2017 as a Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Global Health Equity and UGHE's Vice Chancellor. She currently resides in Kigali.

The Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs (CCP) was founded over 30 years ago by Phyllis Tilson Piotrow as a part the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health's department of Health, Behavior, and Society and is located in Baltimore, Maryland, United States.

Josh Ruxin is an American businessman, academic, and writer. As a businessman, he is co-founder and Executive Chairman of GoodLife Pharmacy, an East Africa–based pharmaceuticals chain in Kenya and Uganda, founder of the Rwandan Health Builders non-profit, and owner of Heaven Restaurant & Boutique Hotel, also in Rwanda.

Healthcare in Rwanda

Healthcare in Rwanda was historically of poor quality, but in recent decades has seen great improvement. Rwanda operates a universal health care system, and is considered to have one of the highest-quality health systems in Africa.

Health Builders is a Rwanda-based non-profit organization that uses systems-level interventions and infrastructure development to enable comprehensive primary health care for communities that need it.

Etienne Karita is a Rwandan scientist who has been researching HIV/AIDS in Rwanda since the mid-1980s. He has held numerous leadership positions in different organizations that are working to control HIV in Rwanda. Some of his work is concentrated on preventing mother to child transmission of HIV and in collaboration with Projet San Francisco, he has studied HIV in discordant couples.

References

  1. John H. Richardson, "Society: Jeffrey Sachs", Esquire December 1, 2003. Retrieved 2012-11-06; "Josh Ruxin", Huffington Post, Retrieved 2012-10-06
  2. "Deworming campaign treats more than 5 million children, mothers" Archived 2016-03-04 at the Wayback Machine , Rwanda News Agency, August 2008, 2008, Retrieved 2012-11-01
  3. Robert Langreth, “The Rwanda Cure”, Forbes, October 29, 2007, Retrieved 2012-10-25
  4. “Living the Dream: Prof. Josh Ruxin: Anti-Poverty, Pro-Prosperity Crusader” Archived 2013-11-02 at the Wayback Machine The New Times, Retrieved 2012-07-09
  5. "What We Do" Archived 2012-07-20 at the Wayback Machine , The Access Project, Retrieved 2012-07-29
  6. “Funders” Archived 2012-09-15 at the Wayback Machine , The Access Project, Retrieved 2012-06-11