Malawi

The Digital Innovation in Pandemic Control (DIPC) project (2022–2025)—a partnership between Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and Digital Square at PATH—has worked closely with the Malawi Ministry of Health (MOH), including the Digital Health Division (DHD) and Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI), to strengthen Malawi’s digital immunization ecosystem. Recognizing the challenges of fragmented, non-interoperable systems, the DIPC team and MOH conducted a comprehensive ecosystem mapping of digital tools supporting immunization, identifying key gaps and priorities for national scale-up.DIPC Project Pillars in MalawiLocalizing the Digital Adaptation Kit for Immunization (DAK)The project localized the WHO’s Digital Adaptation Kit for Immunizations for Malawi, providing standardized workflows and data elements to guide digital immunization systems. The DAK includes:Core workflows for awareness generation, service delivery, care documentation, vaccine inventory management, and monitoring & evaluation.Detailed user personas and scenarios tailored to Malawi’s health system.Functional and non-functional requirements to support system design and implementation.Developing and Deploying the MaHIS Electronic Immunization (EIS)The DIPC project team partnered with MOH to develop and deploy a new electronic immunization registry (EIR) module within the Malawi Healthcare Information System (MaHIS). The EIR supports:Digital record keeping of all routine immunizations in both online real-time and offline mode.Vaccine inventory control at facilities.Improved dashboards and reporting. The DIPC project rolled out the EIS in Mchinji, Ntcheu, and Salima districts across 46 facilities, targeting 70,000 clients.Strengthening Health Worker CapacityTo ensure sustainability, the DIPC project supported:Two training of trainers sessions for senior health staff.48 facility-level trainings reaching 1,204 health workers, including Disease Control Surveillance Assistants (DCSAs), ICT Coordinators, and Statistical Clerks.Ongoing monitoring visits and refresher trainings to reinforce digital literacy and system use.Key resultsFacilities using new/enhanced solutions: 48Registered users: 1,233Registered clients: 38,810Vaccinations recorded: 215, 200Health workers trained: 1,221 (486 women, 664 men)The implementation of digital tools has significantly improved immunization workflows by reducing manual data entry errors, improving record-keeping, and enabling real-time tracking of immunization schedules.Broader ImpactThe DIPC project’s work in Malawi is setting a model for resilient, interoperable digital immunization systems that can adapt to evolving health needs and future pandemics. The collaborative approach—engaging MOH, GIZ, and local technical partners like Luke International and EGPAF—ensures alignment with national strategies and builds local capacity for long-term success.

The Digital Innovation in Pandemic Control (DIPC) project, launched in November 2022, is a collaborative initiative led by GIZ and Digital Square at PATH to strengthen immunization systems in Ghana, Malawi, and Tanzania. In response to the fragmentation and lack of interoperability exposed during the COVID‑19 pandemic, DIPC works closely with country health ministries to select, localize, and implement digital public health tools—such as Electronic Immunization Registries and WHO SMART-based Digital Adaptation Kits—to build scalable, interoperable, and locally sustainable immunization platforms. Through end-to-end ecosystem mapping, system enhancement, and capacity building, the project aims to create resilient, digitally enabled immunization workflows that can support both routine vaccination and future pandemic preparedness across participating countries by 2025.

My reflections from the 74th Health Ministers’ Conference of the East, Central, and Southern Africa Health Community.

Oxygen therapy is an essential part of ending preventable deaths among children and adults globally. However, reliable access to oxygen, paired with pulse oximetry, remains inadequate across many health facilities in low- and middle-income countries. This series of use cases highlights country examples where tools from the Oxygen delivery toolkit: Resources to plan and scale medical oxygen helped advocates, implementers, and decision-makers to plan, manage, and communicate the value of scaling up oxygen delivery systems and access to oxygen and pulse oximetry.This resource is part of the Oxygen delivery toolkit: Resources to plan and scale medical oxygen. The materials provided within the toolkit can be used together or separately, as needed. The complete toolkit is available at www.path.org/oxygen-delivery-toolkit.

Investing in medical oxygen and respiratory care education closes the gap between oxygen availability and its access.

The trial aimed to determine how well a new, injectable, non-replicating rotavirus vaccine candidate works, compared to a licensed oral rotavirus vaccine in preventing infant diarrhea.

This high-level webinar was part of the VacciNations Campaign, bringing together policymakers, technical teams, key decision-makers and civil society organizations from the African region and beyond.It focused on immunization financing and accountability, and what is needed to ramp up efforts towards the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) 3 targets. The presentations included findings from recent studies on immunization financing, and identified strategies to improve funding and accountability mechanisms to achieve the 2030 SDG 3 targets.

PATH collaborated with the Ministry of Health in Malawi to create an essential spare parts list, determine annual spare part quantities needed, and estimate the cost for the spare parts to facilitate budget and procurement decisions.This analysis suggests that Malawi needs to stock between 23,965 and 73,581 units of spare parts annually to support 12 respiratory care medical device types. The range is driven by the frequency of replacing spare parts, and the variation of spare part costs from local distributors. While providing valuable insights into the spare part requirements for respiratory care devices in Malawi, the study underscores the importance of adequate budgeting and inventory management. The study's findings highlight a significant demand for spare parts within health facilities, suggesting a need for a special annual budget allocation.

Through strong partnerships, Malawi is transforming its digital health system.

Policies that build strong primary health care systems are essential to advancing health equity— but they are complex and difficult to design. PATH created the PHC in Policies Tracker as a consolidated source of information to equip stakeholders including policymakers, advocates, implementers, and donors with information about existing policies that shape PHC systems. This new virtual public dashboard tool maps and analyzes data about national-level health policy documents relevant to primary health care (PHC) in 26 low- and middle- income countries—comparing content of these policies with recommendations laid out in key global-level guidance frameworks such as the WHO PHC Monitoring Framework and Indicators (MFI). The tracker aims to improve understanding of policies for PHC in LMICs, add to the global conversation about how to design robust policy for PHC, and help users identify high-impact opportunities for action toward better health for all. This brief provides an overview of the findings and key takeaways from the tracker project, as well as information about methodology and limitations. Access the tracker at bit.ly/PHC_policy_tracker