Challenges faced by women entrepreneurs in their efforts towards poverty reduction in Mukuru Kwa Njenga; Embakasi East Constituency, Nairobi, Kenya

This study explored the challenges faced by women entrepreneurs and their effects on poverty reduction.  The study focused on women entrepreneurs living in Mukuru Kwa Njenga, a slum within Embakasi East Constituency of Nairobi County; Kenya.  It gave attention to women entrepreneurship as a vehicle towards women empowerment; these two concepts in the development of women were explored.  Studies show that the majority of the world’s poor people are women and especially those living in the slums.  According to a report done on women empowerment by Care International in 2012, of the 1.3 billion people who live in absolute poverty around the globe, 70% are women.  The paradox however is that women empowerment efforts, conferences, and declarations have been ongoing since the 1970s with the aim of improving the well-being of women all over the world.  Yet women live in poverty.  This study sought to address this gap by drawing an understanding as to the challenges that vulnerable women face while enhancing their economic empowerment and that of their households. The study targeted 66 women within five self-help groups in Mukuru Kwa Njenga because these groups bring women together towards the cause of self-empowerment.  All 66 women targeted operated small-scale enterprises referred to as Jua Kali enterprises that are run by the side of the road, and with no permanent business structure.  A mixed methods research design incorporating both qualitative and quantitative research methods was used.  Drawing from the research findings, business skills training is not a challenge faced by women entrepreneurs in Mukuru however they lack assets (68%) and business financing (62%) to grow their businesses which tend to have a one year life span.  Other challenges include domestic violence, limited access to affordable health care services, poor drainage, and sanitation within the slum, lack of a conducive market space among others. Keywords: Women Entrepreneurship, Women Empowerment, Poverty Reduction, Slums DOI: 10.7176/DCS/9-6-10 Publication date:June 30th 201

Group identities in Kenyan SMS messages

Short Message Service (SMS) as a new form of Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) seems to dissolve interaction and social hierarchies, thus resulting in the emergence of social groups. To determine how SMS has resulted in the emergence of social groups, this article explores the issues of group identities and language use in Kenyan text messages. Group identities and language use are examined in terms of age, social hierarchy and gendered identity. An integration of social structures and linguistic structures is emphasised. The findings reveal that a “new” language which presents the group identity of the users has evolved through SMS. Group identities are determined through the social agents of SMS language

Expectations for nursing care in newborn units in Kenya: moving from implicit to explicit standards.

Neonatal mortality currently accounts for 45% of all child mortality in Kenya, standing at 22 per 1000 live births. Access to basic but high quality inpatient neonatal services for small and sick newborns will be key in reducing neonatal mortality. Neonatal inpatient care is reliant on nursing care, yet explicit nursing standards for such care do not currently exist in Kenya. We reviewed the Nursing Council of Kenya 'Manual of Clinical Procedures' to identify tasks relevant for the care of inpatient neonates. An expert advisory group comprising major stakeholders, policy-makers, trainers, and frontline health-workers was invited to a workshop with the purpose of defining tasks for which nurses are responsible and the minimum standard with which these tasks should be delivered to inpatient neonates in Kenyan hospitals. Despite differences in opinions at the beginning of the process, consensus was reached on the minimum standards of neonatal nursing. The key outcome was a comprehensive list and grouping of neonatal nursing task and the minimum frequency with which these tasks should be performed. Second, a simple categorisation of neonatal patients based on care needs was agreed. In addition, acceptable forms of task sharing with other cadres and the patient's family for the neonatal nursing tasks were agreed and described. The process was found to be acceptable to policy-makers and practitioners, who recognised the value of standards in neonatal nursing to improve the quality of neonatal inpatient care. Such standards could form the basis for audit and quality evaluation

Neonatal nasogastric tube feeding in a low-resource African setting - using ergonomics methods to explore quality and safety issues in task sharing.

BACKGROUND: Sharing tasks with lower cadre workers may help ease the burden of work on the constrained nursing workforce in low- and middle-income countries but the quality and safety issues associated with shifting tasks are rarely critically evaluated. This research explored this gap using a Human Factors and Ergonomics (HFE) method as a novel approach to address this gap and inform task sharing policies in neonatal care settings in Kenya. METHODS: We used Hierarchical Task Analysis (HTA) and the Systematic Human Error Reduction and Prediction Approach (SHERPA) to analyse and identify the nature and significance of potential errors of nasogastric tube (NGT) feeding in a neonatal setting and to gain a preliminary understanding of informal task sharing. RESULTS: A total of 47 end tasks were identified from the HTA. Sharing, supervision and risk levels of these tasks reported by subject matter experts (SMEs) varied broadly. More than half of the tasks (58.3%) were shared with mothers, of these, 31.7% (13/41) and 68.3% were assigned a medium and low level of risk by the majority (≥4) of SMEs respectively. Few tasks were reported as 'often missed' by the majority of SMEs. SHERPA analysis suggested omission was the commonest type of error, however, due to the low risk nature, omission would potentially result in minor consequences. Training and provision of checklists for NGT feeding were the key approaches for remedying most errors. By extension these strategies could support safer task shifting. CONCLUSION: Inclusion of mothers and casual workers in care provided to sick infants is reported by SMEs in the Kenyan neonatal settings. Ergonomics methods proved useful in working with Kenyan SMEs to identify possible errors and the training and supervision needs for safer task-sharing

Detection of banana plants and their major diseases through aerial images and machine learning methods: A case study in DR Congo and Republic of Benin

Front-line remote sensing tools, coupled with machine learning (ML), have a significant role in crop monitoring and disease surveillance. Crop type classification and a disease early warning system are some of these remote sensing applications that provide precise, timely, and cost-effective information at different spatial, temporal, and spectral resolutions. To our knowledge, most disease surveillance systems focus on a single-sensor based solutions and lagging the integration of multiple information sources. Moreover, monitoring larger landscapes using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) are challenging, and, therefore combining high resolution satellite imagery data with advanced machine learning (ML) models through the use of mobile apps could help detect and classify banana plants and provide more information on its overall health status. In this study, we classified banana under mixed-complex African landscapes through pixel-based classifications and ML models derived from multi-level satellite images (Sentinel 2, PlanetScope and WorldView-2) and UAV (MicaSense RedEdge) platforms. Our pixel-based classification from random forest (RF) model using combined features of vegetation indices (VIs) and principal component analysis (PCA) showed up to 97% overall accuracy (OA) with less than 10% omission and commission errors (OE and CE) and Kappa coefficient of 0.96 in high resolution multispectral images. We used UAV-RGB aerial images from DR Congo and Republic of Benin fields to develop a mixed-model system combining object detection model (RetinaNet) and a custom classifier for simultaneous banana localization and disease classification. Their accuracies were tested using different performance metrics. Our UAV-RGB mixed-model revealed that the developed object detection and classification model successfully classified healthy and diseased plants with 99.4%, 92.8%, 93.3% and 90.8% accuracy for the four classes: banana bunchy top disease (BBTD), Xanthomonas Wilt of Banana (BXW), healthy banana cluster and individual banana plants, respectively. These approaches of aerial image-based ML models have high potential to provide a decision support system for major banana diseases in Afric

The evolving SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in Africa: Insights from rapidly expanding genomic surveillance

INTRODUCTION Investment in Africa over the past year with regard to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) sequencing has led to a massive increase in the number of sequences, which, to date, exceeds 100,000 sequences generated to track the pandemic on the continent. These sequences have profoundly affected how public health officials in Africa have navigated the COVID-19 pandemic. RATIONALE We demonstrate how the first 100,000 SARS-CoV-2 sequences from Africa have helped monitor the epidemic on the continent, how genomic surveillance expanded over the course of the pandemic, and how we adapted our sequencing methods to deal with an evolving virus. Finally, we also examine how viral lineages have spread across the continent in a phylogeographic framework to gain insights into the underlying temporal and spatial transmission dynamics for several variants of concern (VOCs). RESULTS Our results indicate that the number of countries in Africa that can sequence the virus within their own borders is growing and that this is coupled with a shorter turnaround time from the time of sampling to sequence submission. Ongoing evolution necessitated the continual updating of primer sets, and, as a result, eight primer sets were designed in tandem with viral evolution and used to ensure effective sequencing of the virus. The pandemic unfolded through multiple waves of infection that were each driven by distinct genetic lineages, with B.1-like ancestral strains associated with the first pandemic wave of infections in 2020. Successive waves on the continent were fueled by different VOCs, with Alpha and Beta cocirculating in distinct spatial patterns during the second wave and Delta and Omicron affecting the whole continent during the third and fourth waves, respectively. Phylogeographic reconstruction points toward distinct differences in viral importation and exportation patterns associated with the Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Omicron variants and subvariants, when considering both Africa versus the rest of the world and viral dissemination within the continent. Our epidemiological and phylogenetic inferences therefore underscore the heterogeneous nature of the pandemic on the continent and highlight key insights and challenges, for instance, recognizing the limitations of low testing proportions. We also highlight the early warning capacity that genomic surveillance in Africa has had for the rest of the world with the detection of new lineages and variants, the most recent being the characterization of various Omicron subvariants. CONCLUSION Sustained investment for diagnostics and genomic surveillance in Africa is needed as the virus continues to evolve. This is important not only to help combat SARS-CoV-2 on the continent but also because it can be used as a platform to help address the many emerging and reemerging infectious disease threats in Africa. In particular, capacity building for local sequencing within countries or within the continent should be prioritized because this is generally associated with shorter turnaround times, providing the most benefit to local public health authorities tasked with pandemic response and mitigation and allowing for the fastest reaction to localized outbreaks. These investments are crucial for pandemic preparedness and response and will serve the health of the continent well into the 21st century

Foreign-Trained Health Care Professionals Assets and Needs Assessment: A Focus Group Study

Obstacles to licensure or accreditation can make it difficult for qualified foreign-trained health care professionals (FTHCPs) to contribute on a professional level. The purpose of this African and American Friendship Association for Cooperation and Development (AAFACD) initiative was to assess the needs of unlicensed FTHCPs by identifying potential solutions that would allow them to successfully attain licensure as physicians or nursing professionals in Minnesota. The report includes several recommendations for helping FTHCPs meet the challenges of the licensure process.Conducted on behalf of African and American Friendship Association for Cooperation and Development. Supported by Neighborhood Planning for Community Revitalization (NPCR), a program of the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs (CURA) at the University of Minnesota

Assets and Needs Assessment of Foreign Trained Medical and Nursing Graduates in Minnesota and Utilization of Foreign Trained Healthcare Professional Graduates

While Foreign Trained Health Care Professional Graduates (FTHCPGs) play a critical role in filling the US health care workforce, they endure a complicated set of education and licensing requirements to practice in the US. This report examines 1) The existing barriers and opportunities to overcome those barriers so FTHCPGs can continue to work in their specific medical field after immigrating to Minnesota 2) System adaptations and changes that would be feasible to assist the FTHCPGs to work in their choice of profession. The paper will also compare the model being used in FTHCPGs licensure process in Minnesota to those of California CA, Florida FL and New York NY who have been able to incorporate more foreign trained medical and nursing graduates into their health care delivery than in Minnesota. This report also includes a literature study, ﾑUtilization of Foreign Trained Healthcare Professional Graduates: Strategy to Reduce Health Disparities in Minnesota by Diversifying the Health Work Force'. Foreign-born and foreign-trained professionals play an important role in the delivery of health care in the United States. This paper addresses the issue of Health Disparities in Minnesota and the utilization of FTHCPs as a strategy to reduce health disparities. The need for physicians, particularly in under-represented minorities, continues to grow. There is compelling evidence for the need to increase diversity within the physician workforce to ensure high-quality medical education, access to health care for the underserved, advances in research, and improved business performance.Conducted on behalf of African American Friendship Association for Cooperation and Development. Supported by the Neighborhood Planning for Community Revitalization (NPCR) program at the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs, University of Minnesota

Group identities in Kenyan SMS messages

Short Message Service (SMS) as a new form of Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) seems to dissolve interaction and social hierarchies, thus resulting in the emergence of social groups. To determine how SMS has resulted in the emergence of social groups, this article explores the issues of group identities and language use in Kenyan text messages. Group identities and language use are examined in terms of age, social hierarchy and gendered identity. An integration of social structures and linguistic structures is emphasised. The findings reveal that a “new” language which presents the group identity of the users has evolved through SMS. Group identities are determined through the social agents of SMS language