Source: Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation website
A 4M USD development impact bond (DIB) [ii] can scale and improve Monami to serve 400,000 pregnant and postpartum women in Angola over the next four years.
**For a year, in partnership with Appy People, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, and the Maternity Hospital Lucrécia Paim, maze’s team has been conducting feasibility work on funding a maternal health intervention in Angola - Monami - through outcomes-based commissioning (OBC) [i] to improve and scale Monami's intervention and therefore contribute to better maternal health outcomes in Angola.
Globally, 800 women die of pregnancy-related causes every day. Additionally, 6,400 newborns die daily. Most maternal and child deaths are preventable. Angola is among the countries off track to achieve target 3.1. and 3.2. [iii] of the SDGs, and the increase in maternal health literacy of pregnant and postpartum women can help to get Angola on track.
The World Health Organization (WHO) points out that maternal health literacy is deeply connected with increased uptake of available healthcare services, such as antenatal care (ANC), postnatal care (PNC), and skilled birth attendance (SBA), which are key determinants in preventing maternal and neonatal deaths.
Monami is a free mobile-based maternal health literacy intervention targeting pregnant and postpartum women in Angola.
It is designed to promote education on maternal health topics and empower women to make informed health decisions during pregnancy and the early postpartum period by providing regular educational content on maternal and neonatal healthcare.
This intervention model has been implemented in Luanda since 2022, reaching over 37,000 pregnant women and sending more than 400,000 text messages. It has the potential to be scaled nationwide.
Dr. Manuela Mendes, General Director of the Manuel Pedro Azancot de Menezes Maternal and Child Hospital
Emerging financing instruments that tie funding to outcomes, such as development impact bonds, play a growing role in fostering the impact of innovative and scalable interventions. 292 impact bonds have been launched around the world and 16 in Africa, but not yet in Angola.
Deploying a DIB to fund the scaling of Monami’s intervention could allow for:
The Monami Programme was represented at the "Mobilizing Maternal Health: A Transformative Vision" forum.
This extensive work helped us gather 3 main lessons that we will take away for future feasibility work: