I co-founded IDENTITY AFRICA, a full-service advertising agency in Kigali, Rwanda. Our primary focus was on delivering Social Marketing, IEC, and BCC materials. (IEC: Information, Education, and Communications and BCC: Behavior Change Communications)
We managed five of the largest brands in Rwanda for PSI, the largest NGO in Rwanda. These included two condoms, malaria medication, birth control, and water treatment. Tens of millions a year were spent on marketing, blanketing the country.
The health improvements in Rwanda gained international attention (click read more below). Our agency contributed to these drastic improvements.
Below are approximate statistics from 2003–10:
- HIV/AIDS Rate: 13% to 3%
- HIV/AIDS Deaths: 15k to 4k
- Malaria Cases: 35,688 to 8,517
- Malaria Deaths: Over 4,000 to Under 1,000
- Confirmed Malaria Cases: (2005–2010) Declined by 50%
- Household w/ Mosquito Net: 10% to 80%
- Contraception Use: 17% (2005) to 48%
- Life Expectancy Age: 52 to 63
…
“Over the last ten years, Rwanda’s health system development has led to the most dramatic improvements of health in history. Rwanda is the only country in sub-Saharan Africa on track to meet most of the Millennium Development Goals. Deaths from HIV, TB, and malaria have each dropped by roughly 80 percent over the last decade and the maternal mortality ratio dropped by 60 percent over the same period.”
“Rwanda appears to be stemming the tide of the HIV/AIDS epidemic as health experts report that the HIV prevalence rate in this small East African nation has fallen below 3%…”
“The country has “dramatically” reduced the burden of HIV/AIDS by scaling up education and awareness programs, prevention activities and access to treatment.”
“The number of confirmed malaria cases declined from an average of 35, 688 during 2000– 2005 to 8,517 in 2010, … [a] 76% decline…”
Malaria Journal, 2012
“The use of contraceptives went from 25 percent in 2008 to 45 percent in just three years.”
