Distributing lifesaving mosquito nets to overlooked populations
Through the creation of a simple app and the work of small teams on the ground, mosquito nets that were destined for the landfill were distributed to the people who needed them most.
Challenge
Over 9,000 mosquito nets sat in the basement of the Peace Corps Benin office. The insecticide that treats the nets was nearing its expiration date, which would render the nets unusable.
During the national distribution of mosquito nets in Benin, many of society's most fragile populations were missed because they were not in traditional family homes. These groups included orphans and students who had to travel to a larger town to attend high school.
Solution
After investigating the challenge through user interviews, my team understood that the barrier to mosquito net distribution for Peace Corps volunteers was the extensive paperwork and documentation that the process entailed. We created a simple app that functioned both on and offline to streamline the documentation process. After many rounds of iteration, the app was deployed in the field, where Peace Corps volunteers and their local partners used it to document the need for nets, the distribution of nets, and actual net usage.
Partners
Team
Benjamin Lavin
Results
The app has been used to distribute over 9,000 bed nets and was considered for use in the next national distribution by USAID.
The app became available at the end of January, 2016, and Peace Corps Benin ran out of nets to distribute in mid-October. Compared to the same period of time in 2015, distribution increased by a magnitude of three from 3,404 nets in 2015 to 13,770 nets in 2016. (Certain nets are still distributed using paper, for example, at summer camps and other “special events.”)
According to data collected during distributions, on average, one bed net impacts the health of 4.8 people, meaning that in the time the app was available in 2016 almost 70,000 people’s health may have been positively impacted by Peace Corps Bed Net Distributions.