E4A mission:
Evidence for Action (E4A) is a five year programme which aims to improve maternal and newborn survival in six sub-Saharan countries. Funded by the UK Department for International Development, it focuses on using better information and improved advocacy and accountability to save lives in Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Tanzania.
E4A blog:
Welcome to our blog - this is where the E4A partners share news, info & updates on the project.
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May 15th, 2012, Martina Nguyen 
Mother and baby in Sierra Leone. (Photo source: Save the Children)
Hello all and greetings from London. Many thanks to Dr. Mohamed Yilla for bringing to my attention the stories about the Free Healthcare Initiative in Sierra Leone. If there is anything you would like to see included in the Weekly News Roundup, please feel free to send them to me at: martina [at] advocacyinternational [dot] co [dot] uk.
Here are this week’s major news stories affecting the six countries where E4A operates:
ETHIOPIA
Ethiopia: Dozen international companies to inject US 100 million into economy (AllAfrica)
Ethiopian region to suffer food insecurity after
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May 14th, 2012, Georgia Lee 
Initial ideas – mapping the emotional trajectory of the campaign to increase Maternal and Newborn survival.
After a great creative brainstorming session at the regional meeting the next step for naming and branding the E4A campaign was for us to capture the team’s ideas and send out a request for proposal to some of the outstanding creative agencies we’d identified. I’m happy to say that, after stiff competition, we have contracted ARK based in Nairobi to undertake the first stage of branding – the naming and initial identity design for the project.
Leading the work from ARK is Fady Rostom – and he has a
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May 10th, 2012, Aminu Garba ( 1st published in Daily Trust Newspaper on Tue, 8th may 2012)
The article ‘The Midwives Service Scheme in Nigeria’ written by Seye Abimbola and co published by PLoS Medicine | www.plosmedicine.org May 2012 | Volume 9 | Issue 5 | e1001211 has put the scheme into perspective with respect to supporting Nigeria towards the attainment of Millennium Development Goal 5 of reducing maternal death by 75% by 2015 in comparison to what it was in 2000.
As the article highlighted ‘Nigeria faces a crisis in human resources for health (HRH) in the form of health worker shortages, requiring an immediate and significant increase in the number of health workers , or in the meantime a strategic redistribution
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May 10th, 2012, Martina Nguyen
May 9th, 2012, Carolyn Blake  A series of three articles on developing health systems guidance with contributions from the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute was recently published in PLoS Medicine (Public Library of Science). These articles are especially relevant for E4A as the authors take an in-depth look at:
how health systems guidance is currently formulated in developing countries; the challenges that arise when translating evidence into policy and practice; how research evidence should be translated into guidance to inform policies and improve the delivery of clinical and public health interventions.
The first paper makes a case for developing guidance to inform decisions on health systems-level questions based on an analysis of
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May 2nd, 2012, Martina Nguyen 
Patricia Mawuli Nyekodzi, Ghana’s first female pilot. NGOs in Ghana are currently training women as pilots and primary healthcare workers in an attempt to fight schistosomiasis. Nigeria also produced its first female pilot when Blessing Liman received her commission from the country’s air force this week. (Photo Source: theladychronicles)
Hello from London. Here are this week’s major news stories affecting the six countries where E4A operates:
ETHIOPIA
Ethiopia: Still too many deaths in childbirth (IRIN News)
Jailed Ethiopian journalist Eskinder Nega honoured (BBC World Africa)
21st century pastoralism in southern Ethiopia – in pictures (the Guardian)
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April 24th, 2012, Martina Nguyen 
Students with their instructor at the Makeni Masuba School of Midwifery in Sierra Leone. The school graduated 69 midwives this week. (Photo source: VSO Photo Library)
Greetings from London. Here are this week’s major news stories affecting the six countries where E4A operates:
ETHIOPIA:
Ethiopia PM accuses Eritrea of kidnappings (Reuters)
Ethiopia’s giant dam muddies the waters downstream in Egypt (The National)
Ethiopian PM: Income inequality major threat to global macroeconomic, social stability (Newdire)
GHANA:
Anti-malarial paint comes to Ghana (Myjoyonline)
Ghana to commit specific budget line to sanitation and hygiene (Ghana Business News)
UK assists Ghana with
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April 18th, 2012, Martina Nguyen 
(Photo Source: CP-Africa)
As we are in the process of developing our communications strategy, we need to know not only what kinds of technology are available in the E4A countries, but also how they are used. I’ve just finished reading a fascinating article from the Financial Times about BlackBerrys in Nigeria that I would like to share. Such information has important implications for E4A. How can we harness this technological potential for our project?
As the FT does not allow reposting of its articles, I have summarized the salient points of the article below. Also, you can read it here.
Although BlackBerry smartphones have
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April 18th, 2012, Martina Nguyen
April 10th, 2012, Martina Nguyen
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