Health projects

 In terms of health projects, HIRDA operates within five thematic themes which includes HIV/AIDS, Malaria, Female Genital Mutilation, Mother-Childcare and Social Health Worker training.

HIV/AIDS
Based on our vast experience and knowledge of Somalia socio-cultural values, HIRDA has in the past years been trying to reduce the wrong cultural perceptions that are being held about the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Somalia. Currently HIV/AIDS is seen as a taboo and it is hardly discussed publicly in most Somalian communities. Due to these cultural perceptions and the fear of been isolated those who are suffering from HIV/AIDS infection are not able to talk to anyone even including their family member about their infection.
Projects on HIV/AIDS intervention are focused on awareness creation, encouraging testing and training people to specialize in testing, counseling and crusaders with special skills in information and awareness spreading.

Malaria
Malaria is still a major cause of early death in Somalia like in most African countries. With the destruction of homes that resulted from the years of wars and civil strives, more Somalis are exposed to malaria infection. Unfortunately the Ministry of Health (MOH) Somalia which has to develop a national control strategic plan to guide malaria control and prevention activities in the country is currently not operational.
For this reason, HIRDA has been very active not only in the dissemination of information on how to prevent malaria but has also in the past years been able to donate malaria prevention materials such as mosquito nets and immune protection medicines with the support of UNICEF.
HIRDA for instance was successfully able to distribute LLIN to 10500 households in Sakow and 79 villages in the Sakow district which is a high malaria locality situated in Southern Somalia.

Female Genital Mutilation

Female Genital Mutilation is a culture still preserved in most developing countries, including Somali where the rate is relatively high. Even though many girls bleed to death or die of infection and those who survive are traumatized through their lives and can suffer adverse health effects during marriage and pregnancy, it is still difficult to disseminate information on the danger of this practice. It is for this reason that HIRDA has been waging an awareness campaign against FGM since 2000.

Mother-Childcare Projects

HIRDA,s projects on Mother-Child are aimed at reducing mortality and morbidity rate among children of less than five years and also reducing the malnutrition status of children in Bardera district. This is done by redistributing Outpatient Therapeutic programme food to children under 5 years old.
Our Mother-Childcare projects are carried out in several villages which are located in the Bardera district. These villages includes Bullawein, Tubako, Gar-galis and Horsed MCH.
With the logistical support of UNICEF who donated cartons of plumpynut us we were able to distribute RUFT ((Ready to use Therapeutic Food) to a total of 57 children in the 4 targeted villages.