Product/Service Development

Diarrheal diseases are a leading cause of morbidity in Yemen, which is now suffering the largest cholera outbreak in modern history with more than a million cases. UNICEF warned of another impending cholera wave. About 16 million people Yemeni lack access to safe drinking water and sanitation. Frequent cuts in electricity compromised healthcare and clinics must now rely on generators while struggling to find costly fuel. In Dec 2017 price of diesel increased by 235% compared to 4 months prior.

To provide safe, clean, dignified sanitation to families in displaced/informal communities, toilets need to be available and easily accessible, preferably in or near the home. But this requires new solutions that can fit and operate in non-sewered homes. Where flushing isn't an option, sewage accumulates rapidly onsite and removal costs become unsustainable. No-flush toilets would have to eliminate onsite sewage nearly as fast as it accumulates, without needing power or plumbing, at low-cost.

Lack of access to water in South Sudan is a cause and consequence of war which continues to worsen the humanitarian situation. South Sudan lacks water infrastructure and the few available water points are a constant source of intertribal conflicts. Most solutions to the water crisis in South Sudan focus on drinking water. While this is vital, water for farming & livestock is life-saving. Increasing droughts combined with war leading to lack of infrastructure & management drives water scarcity.

Health services, along with WASH, in conflict zones suffer from damaged infrastructure and a lack of essential supplies at a time when their services are overwhelmed, particularly in areas like surgery and trauma. The typical response is to import new equipment, at a high cost and subject to extreme logistical obstacles. As a result, people die waiting for treatment, or are put at increased risk of life-threatening infections as lack of equipment means that normal procedures cannot be followed.

Millions of people in the most vulnerable, conflict-affected places are still missing from all publicly available maps, with the places they live appearing as single points without names. Provision of targeted preventive or faster curative interventions are impossible without knowing precise origins of a patient, where refugees/IDPs have sheltered, and locations of/gaps in basic services. Humanitarians lack this basic data essential for time-critical prioritization decisions that can save lives.

The innovation will aim at tackling gender inequality: the fundamental root cause of all forms of GBV. Women refugees are vulnerable, and it is estimated that 86% of the refugees in host communities live below the poverty line. Syrian women refugee also face major challenges in accessing basic resources and one-fifth of girls never even go outside their homes in Syria and displacement has made it even less likely. Lack of information is the major barrier to prevention of violence in this crisis.

In Peru, half of children younger than 2 years old have anemia 1,2. Anemia is associated with cognitive and psychomotor delay 3,4. In 2015, the Peruvian Ministry of Health (MINSA) implemented a micronutrient supplementation program to reduce anemia, but was unsuccessful according to recent indicators. Anemia in children is associated with poor breastfeeding habits, low intake of iron-rich foods, an absence of proper hygiene practices, and the lack of follow-up treatment by health personnel.

Anywhere when a baby is born very small, less than 2.5 kg, birth attendants need warnings to timely make decisions as refer him to the hospital. Without the critical care, the newborn survival could be neglected, as well appropriate management of the respiratory distress syndrome. Most of the lives could be saved with prompt hazard identification, but current methods remains an unsolved challenge because of the disadvantages as low accessibility and the high cost of the obstetric ultrasound

Data from the World Health Organization states that roughly 303,000 women and 2.7 million newborns died in 2015 due to pregnancy- and childbirth-related complications, of which 10% to 15% were directly linked to unhygienic conditions during labor and birth. PATH seek to validate the usability, acceptability, effectiveness, and cost requirements of the SE Flow device in eight district-level labor wards in Kisumu, Kenya.

PATH has developed an innovative, low-cost, newborn respiratory package that includes a low-cost bubble continuous positive airway pressure (bCPAP) device that can blend air/oxygen without compressed air and without electricity. The package includes nasal prongs, a pulse oximeter, as well as training materials. The immediate goal of this project is to eliminate preventable newborn deaths in Uganda by expanding access to safe bCPAP therapy.