Programs
HEAL Africa’s hospital and community development work address the root causes of illness and poverty for the people of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. The hospital and the 28 women’s houses in Maniema and North Kivu have provided a safe place for many victims of the war, and have been a motor for combating poverty and promoting community cohesion over the past 14 years.
HEAL My PEOPLE
War is a health issue
Congo today is linked to the western world by cell phones and computers, coffee and coltan. The ongoing violence in northeastern Congo is aimed at civilians, to clear them from mining areas which are being protected by various military groups who export coltan, gold, diamonds and other precious minerals with impunity, without regulation or care for the local residents and without paying taxes to support a working government.
| More...Healing for Survivors of Rape
Rape is a horrifying weapon. It not only damages bodies but it tears apart lives and communities. HEAL Africa's program for gender-based violence, Heal My People, works to provide survivors of rape and gender-based violence in the Congo with comprehensive healing opportunities that help women find safety and start to heal their bodies, souls and minds.
| More...Women Stand Up Together
Congo’s women have been portrayed as victims in an endless war. HEAL Africa is working to build and support new communities of women in Africa who are empowered socially, physically, spiritually, and economically to create a new social fabric in communities that are torn apart by conflict. They are becoming a force for change in a different future for the Congo. In a fragmented postwar society, with many women living on their own, the traditional roles and structures have changed. Women are experiencing new responsibilities and are now recognizing that they have assumed new roles. This has led some groups of women to challenge a system they may never before have questioned. It has brought women together who have suffered the same issues: widowhood, rape, the need to support their children alone. Now they are discovering the strength they have in working together.
Gender and Justice
HEAL Africa’s Gender and Justice Program seeks to tackle the root causes of gender inequality in the Congolese society. Through decades of war and centuries of exploitation, traditional social and community structures have been broken down to the point where the majority of the population of Congo does not even know that they have rights, as shown in a study by HEAL Africa in Maniema province, and echoed by an informal survey of the women at HEAL Africa’s hospital in Goma. Not one could list one right they knew of.
| More...Safe Motherhood and Micro-Insurance
HEAL Africa's Safe Motherhood Prenatal Care and Micro-Insurance program is an extremely innovative initiative that increases access to health care for birthing mothers. Women of reproductive age pay into maternity micro-insurance groups that ensure that they can receive proper medical support through pregnancy, delivery and neo-natal care. The insurance groups are locally managed on a micro-level, with each member paying into the program and each member receiving the needed support from an appropriate, health facility when it is their turn to have a child. The appropriate level of medical care might be care from a retrained traditional birth attendant, the local health center, or a local hospital. Early screening and prenatal care is essential to identifying high-risk deliveries and assessing the needed care levels for birthing mothers.
HIV Harm Reduction
HIV and AIDS have dramatically altered life for many in Congo.Too often the religious community has chosen not to become involved.Goma is an exception.The Choose Life program, known locally by its French name, Choisir la Vie, has been working since 2000 to educate communities about HIV/AIDS by mobilizing all the faith communities--Muslim, mainline Protestant, Pentecostal, Catholic, and Kimbanguist--to respond with compassion to the challenge of HIV/AIDS. All of the activist trainers are volunteers chosen by their community. They educate, encourage prevention, and accompany those affected by HIV. HEAL Africa also has the largest medical HIV treatment intervention for children in North Kivu province.
| More...Action in Community
A Holistic Model to Build and Strengthen Communities
War destroys families, communities, and nations. It dislocates their members and breaks down the social fabric. Any meaningful response in its aftermath requires the strengthening of community life. Every HEAL Africa initiative includes the goal of supporting, building, growing, healing, and facilitating communities. At the heart of all our community-based work is the Nehemiah Initiative, which is an interfaith program that works within existing communities to build healing and health. Our initiatives will take root and grow sustainably within whole communities where everyone is a shareholder.
| More...Agriculture and Food Security
Hospital, Community Based Medical and Preventative Treatment
HEAL Africa’s hospital in Goma is a center of excellence, with specialist care and a training hospital. Young medical professionals can work with seasoned physicians, learn and pursue research while gaining practical experience which will help them as they become the future of health care in Congo. Community-based programs to prevent health problems like fistula or malnutrition are linked to the hospital and to the doctors practicing there in a unique blend of practical knowledge of the culture and practices and access to first-world experience which will affect the health futures of the Congolese people.
| More...Medical Training
Community Mobilization and Post-Conflict Rebuilding
The Nehemiah Initiative facilitates local community leaders to reflect on their own situation and resources in the light of the story of Nehemiah who returns to rebuild his city against all odds after it had been destroyed in war. This story is common to all the faith groups where HEAL Africa works: Catholics, Protestants, Kimbanguists, and Muslims. Local leaders choose activists who are trained in mediation and community mobilization to define ways to help the most vulnerable within their village: the handicapped, widows, orphans, and victims of sexual violence.
| More...Health Care
HEAL Africa's medical center in Goma is a well recognized teaching hospital providing quality care. HEAL Africa aims to develop community-based healthcare initiatives across rural areas in eastern DR Congo by training healthcare professionals, providing services and supplies, and is one of the few local institutions conducting health research in the conflict-ridden region.
| More...Micro-Grants
HEAL Africa has provided micro-grants for thousands of vulnerable people who often live on less than a dollar a day. The micro-grant strategy was developed by the Congolese staff of HEAL Africa and not by an institution that is not connected to the reality on the ground. The ongoing unrest in Congo calls for a different type of financial assistance and HEAL Africa uses financial training, savings collectives, small business training, and community accountability to maximize the impact of the micro-grant.
Gender-based Violence: Heal My People
The Heal My People program provides medical treatment, psychosocial support, and economic assistance to survivors of gender-based violence. HEAL Africa works with a network of trained counselors in areas outside of Goma to identify and assist women who have been raped and tortured by rogue militias and with women who suffer from obstetric fistula due to complicatins in childbirth.
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