A total of 1,300 places of worship are to be used as treatment centres every Fridays to Sundays in Acholi sub region.

This was revealed at the launch of the Family Health days at Gulu Archdiocese last weekend by the UNICEF chief incharge of Acholi, Lango, West Nile and Bunyoro;  Mr Sharma Nerinder who noted that this will be a new strategy to expand additional outreach medical services to communities.

He said that the programme will be running four times in a year, January, April, July and October targeting children under five years of age. 

Others targeted will are: women in reproductive health, 15-49 years, pregnant mothers, children from 1-14 years for de-worming, early infant diagnosis, those with blood pressure and diabetes in both adult women and men and birth registration for children below five years who have never been registration.

Called “Family health days” the pilot project will be implanted in the 58 poorly performing district of Uganda, in terms of health care and it will run until 2013.

The District Health Officer for Gulu Dr Paul Onek, noted that on many occasions when community outreaches are conducted some people are left out especially those in remote areas. 

“Some people have been affected by the long distance as a result, have shunned health facilities. We believe with places of worship we shall be able to treat the entire family with support from the village health teams, youth groups and local government officials,” he said. 

Every year 9.7 million children die throughout the world without celebrating their fifth birth day with 4.4 in sub Saharan Africa alone. These children die of treatable and preventable disease like pneumonia, malaria and Diarrhoea.

The preliminary results of the demographic and health survey conducted in Uganda last year, revealed that the under five mortality rate is 90 per 1,000 live birth and maternal mortality rate is 350 per 100,000 live birth.

Health workers from health centres will provide services at places of worship once every quarter during family health days.

UNICEF said that out of the seven districts in Acholi sub region, DPT 3 and measles immunization coverage is below 80 percent, health facility delivery in all the district is at 53 percent while antenatal care coverage is below 40 percent.