Voices from the Capacity Project

In Kenya's remote North Eastern Province, a woman nervously approached the Ijara District Hospital. She wanted to learn about family planning but feared for her privacy. In her deeply religious community, comprised mainly of ethnic Somali Muslims, households have an average of eight children and family planning is viewed with suspicion. "Are you going to keep the secret?" she asked the young nurse.

Nurse Susan Kajuju accepted a post at Ijara a year ago through the Capacity Project's Emergency Hiring Plan. She was among 830 health workers recruited and deployed to 219 key sites across the country. "When I came here there was only one method given to the clients," she recalls, "and I found very few are taking the methods—five in a month, ten in a month." Modern contraceptive prevalence among married women here is less than 1%, far lower than the national rate of 39%.