COMMUNITY
HEALTH
WORKERS 
Community health workers work – and ours have not lost a single mother or child in their care in over ten years.
Around the world and in Mali, when trained community health workers provide health education and rapid referral to health centers, mothers and children are healthier. Mali Health has 57 community health workers who are paid, supervised, and continually trained.
Paid community health workers are not a part of the peri-urban health system in Mali. Only rural communities have the community health workers known as ASC – agents de la santé communautaire. There are volunteer health workers known as relais – but there is no formal system for their training or support.
We believe that community health workers play an important role in peri-urban communities and that they are a key component of a strong, local, community health system that can bring health to all.
Here’s more about them, their work, and their commitment to their communities.
I decided to become a community health worker seven years ago when poverty was increasing in my community. Children were ill and unable to have adequate healthcare and more mothers were losing children during pregnancies because they received no prenatal care. So I decided to become a part of the solution.
- Sidi Fane, Sikoro
WHAT COMMUNITY HEALTH WORKERS DO
Every day in peri-urban communities across Bamako, our community health workers:
- visit enrolled families to monitor health and growth
- ensure completion of routine primary care
- refer mothers and children to the health center when needed
- provide important preventive health information at every visit
OUR RESULTS
51
community health workers
serving
8
peri-urban communities
in Bamako
100%
on-time vaccination
54,596
home visits in 2023
UPDATES
Investing in health workers, from the ground up
During World Health Worker Week, let’s remember that communities and patients are not just the recipients of health worker services, but investors in them.
Training and supporting a high-impact team of community health leaders
In January, our community health worker team celebrated another year of not losing a single mother or child in their care. Their achievement is remarkable in any given year, but the disruptions posed by the pandemic makes these past two years particularly...
How a strong community health system keeps mothers at the heart of primary care
In March, one of our health center partners, CSCOMSEKASI, reported 2 new malnutrition cases. That may not seem like many, but malnutrition is one of the leading causes of preventable deaths among children under age 5 in Mali. One of the areas served by CSCOMSEKASI is...
Mali Health improves maternal and child health by supporting women, communities, and the community health system to develop local solutions that ensure every mother and child has access to quality primary care.
US //
PO Box 51632, Durham, NC 27717
Mali //
Hamdallaye ACI 2000
Rue 100, Porte 222
Commune IV du District de Bamako
Côté Ouest de l’Ecole de Maintien de la Paix Alione Blondin Beye
info@malihealth.org
