Background

Highly diverse in language, population size, culture, politics, and economics, the countries of West Africa share common challenges - poverty, poor health, educational and social systems, low status of women, and gender imbalance. Today, 240 million people live in the region, with more than 70% living in absolute poverty. West Africa's poor maternal and child health, high mortality rates, rapid population growth, and increasing rates of HIV and AIDS are direct results of people's limited access to health care and the low quality of services. Civil strife further undermines the performance of already strained national health services, and high mobility contributes to the increased transmission of HIV.

To address their countries' common problems, West African leaders are taking a regional approach to strengthen the power, cost-effectiveness and quality of their response. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has developed a five-year regional health improvement strategy to support this effort. To transform this strategy into reality, USAID is supporting the Action for West Africa Region Reproductive Health (AWARE-RH) Project in 21 West African countries.

Photo credit: Carrie Svingen