The Church Health Association of Kenya (CHAK) partnered with health facilities managed by faith-based organizations (FBOs), religious leaders, and community health volunteers to increase access to family planning in western Kenya. FBO-managed health facilities saw large increases in family planning uptake over the 5-year project, particularly for implants.

Introduction: Religious leaders are universally recognized as having an influence on immunization uptake and coverage in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Despite this, there is limited understanding of three questions: 1) how do religious leaders impact the uptake and coverage of immunization in LMICs? 2) what successful strategies exist for working with local faith actors to improve immunization acceptance? and 3) what evidence gaps exist in relation to faith engagement and immunization? Methods: In January 2021, we searched PubMed and Google Scholar databases covering the period from January 1, 2011, to January 15, 2021, with key search terms related to faith engagement and immunization in peer-reviewed literature and conducted a gray literature review to answer these three questions. We excluded articles covering faith engagement and immunization in high-income countries, news articles, online blogs, social media postings, and articles in languages outside of English. Data were coded to guide thematic analysis. Results: We found extensive evidence supporting the value of religious engagement for immunization promotion and acceptance in LMICs across faiths. However, there was limited rigorous evidence and examples of specific approaches for engaging local faith actors to strengthen immunization uptake in LMICs. As a result, there is a lack of widely shared knowledge of what works (or doesn’t) and successful models for engaging local faith actors.  Additional current evidence gaps include: few rigorous study designs; a lack of vaccine hesitancy studies outside of Nigeria and Pakistan; and limited exploration of faith engagement and immunization in religions other than Islam and Christianity. Conclusions: Our review findings reinforce the powerful role local faith actors play in diverse communities within LMICs in both promoting and inhibiting immunization uptake. The literature review comes at a critical time, given the urgent need to expand access to COVID-19 vaccination in LMICs. Findings from this review will advance understanding on how to more effectively engage local faith actors in promoting immunization campaigns and addressing vaccine hesitancy, which is more complex than expected. Further study is needed to understand how to most effectively counter vaccine hesitancy in different geographic, linguistic, and socio-cultural contexts.

Common perinatal mental disorders are the most frequent complications of pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period, and the prevalence among women in low- and middle-income countries is the highest at nearly 20%. Women are the cornerstone of a healthy and prosperous society and until their mental health is taken as seriously as their physical wellbeing, we will not improve maternal mortality, morbidity and the ability of women to thrive. On the heels of several international efforts to put perinatal mental health on the global agenda, we propose seven urgent actions that the international community, governments, health systems, academia, civil society, and individuals should take to ensure that women everywhere have access to high-quality, respectful care for both their physical and mental wellbeing. Addressing perinatal mental health promotion, prevention, early intervention and treatment of common perinatal mental disorders must be a global priority.

Although it is often assumed that religion has a negative influence on family planning (FP), virtually all faith traditions support the concept of healthy timing and spacing of pregnancy. n

Background and aims: Faith-based organizations (FBOs) provide a substantial portion of the health care services in many African countries. FBO facilities do consider family planning and reproductive health services as essential to reducing maternal and child mortality, and to the growth of healthy families. Many health facilities, however, struggle to maintain adequate stocks of reproductive health (RH) supplies because of the various RH supply chains and funding sources, which often operate separately from other medicines and supplies. The purpose of this study is to identify the types of supply chain systems used by African faith-based health facilities to acquire reproductive health products (clotrimazole, combined oral contraceptive pills, contraceptive implants, CycleBeads®, emergency contraception, Erythromycin, female condoms, injectable contraceptives, intra-uterine contraceptive devices, magnesium sulfate, male condoms, Methyldopa, Misoprostol, Nifedpine, Oxytocin, and Progestin-only pills), to describe their problems and challenges, and to identify possible corrective actions.