Maria May, the Senior Program Officer for Financial Services from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), visited Makerere University School of Public Health (MakSPH) in Kampala, Uganda. She was received by Makerere’s Assoc. Professor Peter Waiswa, the Project Director of the Digital Health Payment Initiative and Research in Africa Project (DHPI-R) a Gates-funded investment.
The visit was aimed at discussing the groundbreaking research supported by the foundation and focused on strategies to advance digital payments in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The DHPI-R is a collaborative project funded by the Gates Foundation between Makerere University and the University of Dakar (UCAD) Senegal, with the purpose of promoting digital health worker payments to enhance effective campaign delivery in sub-Saharan Africa.
During the visit, Maria had an opportunity to meet with Prof. Rhoda Wanyenze, the Dean of MakSPH, who warmly welcomed her. They had a fruitful discussion and among what was discussed are the ways to strategize and ensure the sustainability of the partnership between Makerere University and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Maria also had a meeting with the entire project team, which consisted of members from both the University of Dakar in Senegal and MakSPH. The UCAD team led by Prof. Adama Faye attended virtually.
Dr. Victoria Nankabirwa and Prof. Edward Makumbi, both associated with MakSPH, were also present. They are part of the team conducting a randomized controlled trial (RCT) in Uganda to study the effectiveness of mobile money payments to the vaccination campaign healthcare workers on polio vaccination campaign coverage and quality. The RCT study is one of the internal sub-grants issued by the DHPI-R project to generate evidence pertaining to Digital payments for healthcare.
Speaking at the meeting, Dr. Nankabirwa and Prof. Makumbi shared the preliminary findings from the RCT study with Maria May. These findings shed light on the potential of digital health payments in revolutionizing healthcare delivery in Uganda and Beyond.
On the same grounds, the DHPI-R student awardees showcased their abstracts on various studies they conducted. Maria May was deeply impressed by the dedication and passion displayed by the students in their pursuit of knowledge and understanding in the realm of digital health.
By. Judith Grace Amoit