• Armenia
• Belize
• Costa Rica
• Eastern Caribbean
• El Salvador
• Ethiopia
• Guatemala
• India
• Kenya
• Lesotho
• Liberia
• Mali
• Namibia
• Nicaragua
• Panama
• Rwanda
• Senegal
• South Africa
• Southern Sudan
• Swaziland
• Tanzania
• Uganda
• Ukraine
• Zambia

From the expanding Sahara in the north to the fertile Niger River basin in the south and east, Mali covers a broad section of western Africa. It is home to the fabled city of Timbuctou as well as the modern capital of Bamako. Although rich in history, in economic terms Mali is one of the world’s ten poorest nations. The country’s poverty has contributed to limited health care resources, which in turn have led to low life expectancy and high maternal and infant mortality rates.

IntraHealth is working with local partners to strengthen Mali's national health systems, increase access to maternal and child health, family planning and reproductive health care services and enhance community health resources. In addition, IntraHealth is working to strengthen health care services in areas such as nutrition, immunization, diarrhea control and malaria treatment. Our efforts are:

• Providing refresher training for doctors, nurses and midwives, who then coach community-based health agents
• Providing technical assistance, training and support to the Ministry of Health, USAID/Mali and private-sector partners
• Working to increase access to active management of the third stage of labor (AMTSL), a practice to prevent postpartum hemorrhage (PPH), the leading cause of maternal death
• Assisting USAID’s Prevention of Postpartum Hemorrhage Initiative (POPPHI) to show that a group of health workers, matrones, can be authorized and trained in AMTSL to further increase access to this life-saving practice
• Strengthening the Ecole des Infirmiers de Gao and promoting promising practices at this private-sector nurse-training school
• Enhancing national and regional human resources information systems.

For more information about IntraHealth's work with Assistance Technique Nationale on antenatal care, see the USAID article here.

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Donors/Projects: USAID (Capacity Project, Keneya Ciwara, Assistance Technique Nationale)

Partners, Keneya Ciwara: CARE (lead)

Partners, Assistance Technique Nationale: Abt Associates (lead)

Selected health statistics for Mali (WHO, accessed July 2007):
Life expectancy, in years (m/f): 45/47
Probability of dying under 5 years of age (per 100 live births): 218
Adult prevalence of HIV/AIDS: 1.9%
Maternal mortality (2004 stats) (per 100,000 live births): 1200