Log out
My profile and settings
My bookmarks
Comment history
Please complete your account verification. Resend verification email.
today
This verification token has expired.
today
Your email address has been verified. Update my profile.
today
Your account has been deactivated. Sign in to re-activate your account.
today
View all newsletters in the newsletter archive
today
You are now unsubscribed from receiving emails.
today
Sorry, we were unable to unsubscribe you at this time.
today
0
0
Back to profile
Comment Items
You have not left any comments yet.
title
you replied to a comment:
name
description
Saved Posts
You haven’t bookmarked any posts yet.

Lately, I’ve found myself drawn to the kinds of books I would’ve liked as a kid.

Read more
Become a Gates Notes Insider
Sign up
Log out
Personal Information
Title
Mr
Mrs
Ms
Miss
Mx
Dr
Cancel
Save
This email is already registered
Cancel
Save
Please verify email address. Click verification link sent to this email address or resend verification email.
Cancel
Save
Email and Notification Settings
Send me updates from Bill Gates
You must provide an email
On
Off
Send me Gates Notes survey emails
On
Off
Send me the weekly Top of Mind newsletter
On
Off
Email me comment notifications
On
Off
On-screen comment notifications
On
Off
Interests
Select interests to personalize your profile and experience on Gates Notes.
Saving Lives
Energy Innovation
Improving Education
Alzheimer's
Philanthropy
Book Reviews
About Bill Gates
Account Deactivation
Click the link below to begin the account deactivation process.
If you would like to permanently delete your Gates Notes account and remove it’s content, please send us a request here.

Growing around grief

Wendo Aszed’s best friend died. Then she did something remarkable.

Now she and her team provide services for women and girls throughout rural Kenya.

|
0

As a child growing up in the 1980s on a small farm in western Kenya, Wendo Aszed found it difficult to make good friends. She finally found a confidant when she was in her twenties and working at a bank in the city of Nakuru, Kenya. Her friend was a smart, kind man who became someone “I would die for,” Wendo says.

In 2007, he told her that he had just tested positive for HIV. Wendo immediately got to work trying to help him get lifesaving anti-retroviral medication (ARVs). But by that time, her friend had already contracted meningitis, and he died less than a month later. “When you have the kind of grief I felt, you might grow around it, like a tree grows around a rock,” she explains. “But you never, ever lose it.”

In the hope of saving others from the same fate, Wendo started visiting nearby villages and engaging women in wide-ranging conversations about their health and lives. Eventually she was able to build enough trust to offer gentle advice on how they might find help for addressing their biggest challenges—from HIV infection to the loss of young children at the hands of abusers in the community.

Wendo was so passionate about this mission that, in 2009, she quit her financially secure job at the bank and began helping the women full time. “I had no formal training for this, and I had absolutely no savings to do it, but I just had to do it,” she recalls. She recruited a group of mentors from the local nonprofit community and set up an organization, which she called Dandelion Africa—a tribute to the resilience of women thriving in difficult environments. Dandelion Africa is how Wendo grew around her grief.

The first two years of operations almost broke her. She had no grant money or other resources to pay herself or anyone else. “Ironically, I felt selfish doing what I was doing,” she says. “I knew I was helping these women, but our family was going through hell. My husband did his best to support us with his earnings as a farm manager, but we barely had enough to pay school fees for our children.”

Just when Wendo was about to give up, the Kenyan government gave Dandelion Africa its first grant—a total of $3,500. The grant allowed Dandelion to provide HIV testing and counseling to almost everyone in one community. Through this work, Wendo learned just how many people living with HIV had no medical or psychological support. She saw that she had to go upstream—that is, not just ensure that women could get ARVs but also help change the economic and social conditions that were leading to such high rates of transmission.

Even as she started to line up the resources to go upstream, Wendo faced significant obstacles because of her gender. Once, when she sat down with a local official as she was organizing a government-funded free health clinic for his community, he started to tell her that she would have to pay for the doctors’ and nurses’ gasoline, the staff lunches, and washing the uniforms. When she resisted, he stood up and said, “In my tribe, when a woman speaks like that to a man, we slap her.” Wendo replied: “In my tribe, when a man hits a woman, we kill him.” The official sat down and said, “Okay, let’s plan this clinic.”

Over the subsequent decade, Dandelion built an all-Kenyan staff and a network of more than 200 volunteers, providing comprehensive health, economic, and educational services across a large swath of rural Kenya. Today, Dandelion Africa provides one of the best examples I’ve seen of community-led problem solving.

She and her team built—partly with their own hands—the all-hours Dandelion Medical Centre. The facility, which opened three years ago, is now driving down maternal mortality, HIV transmission from mothers to their babies, and vaccine-preventable diseases in a region where families previously had little access to even the most basic care. “When I first started the organization, I was barely staying alive,” Wendo says. “To come full circle and open a medical center that ensures every woman in the region can get quality care, that was just overwhelming to me. I just wish my best friend could have been with us at the opening.”

Dandelion Africa is also taking primary care directly to families. Its nurses hop on motorbikes and travel to homes, where they provide immunization, HIV testing, and other services. Dandelion Africa has also helped thousands of women and girls access contraceptives and sanitary supplies for the first time.

Wendo’s organization has also launched efforts to empower women and girls. For example, it helps women access small loans for starting their own businesses. It helps women adopt profitable farming techniques. And Wendo’s 22-year-old son helped create a successful effort to engage men and boys as advocates for women and girls. “When I see men becoming champions fighting FGM and whole villages saying no to FGM because they see how it harms the whole community, I know we’re doing something right,” Wendo says.

Counterintuitively, Wendo often finds it even more difficult to change women’s perceptions than men’s. “Sometimes, the women simply can’t imagine what it would be like not to be beaten by their husbands,” she says. “But we’ve learned how to reach them. We share stories that help them envision a different path.”

While the name Dandelion Africa suggests that Wendo has aspirations to expand in other parts of the continent, that is not the case. “We are going to stay in the hardest parts of Kenya, where no one else wants to work,” she explains. To achieve greater scale, she is working to cultivate 50 more dandelion-type leaders around the country.

Although finding 50 others with Wendo’s drive will not be easy, I’m optimistic that this tough, resilient leader will succeed.

Meet more of my heroes in the field

Discussion
Thank you for being part of the Gates Notes Insider community.
Not seeing your comment? You can read our policy on moderating comments here and learn about our Gates Notes badges here.
Badge
📌
Pinned by
Gates Notes
Badge
ʼʼ
0 responses
Sort by
all
all
most
top
old
Comments loading...
CTW
Thanks for visiting the Gates Notes. We'd like your feedback.
Become a Gates Notes Insider
Join the Gates Notes community to access exclusive content, comment on stories, participate in giveaways, and more.
SIGN UP
Already have an account?
Log in here
Logout:


Become a Gates Notes Insider
Become a Gates Notes Insider
Join the Gates Notes community to get regular updates from Bill on key topics like global health and climate change, to access exclusive content, comment on stories, participate in giveaways, and more.
Already joined? Log in
Please send me updates from Breakthrough Energy on efforts to combat climate change.
On
Off
LOG IN
SIGN UP
Title
Mr
Mrs
Ms
Miss
Mx
Dr
This email is already registered. Enter a new email, try signing in or retrieve your password
Why are we collecting this information? Gates Notes may send a welcome note or other exclusive Insider mail from time to time. Additionally, some campaigns and content may only be available to users in certain areas. Gates Notes will never share and distribute your information with external parties.
Bill may send you a welcome note or other exclusive Insider mail from time to time. We will never share your information.
Sign up
We will never share or spam your email address. For more information see our Sign Up FAQ. By clicking "Sign Up" you agree to the Gates Notes Terms of Use / Privacy Policy.
Street address
City
postal_town
State Zip code
administrative_area_level_2
Country
Data
Gates Notes Insider Sign Up FAQ

Q. How do I create a Gates Notes account?

A. There are three ways you can create a Gates Notes account:

  • Sign up with Facebook. We’ll never post to your Facebook account without your permission.
  • Sign up with Twitter. We’ll never post to your Twitter account without your permission.
  • Sign up with your email. Enter your email address during sign up. We’ll email you a link for verification.

Q. Will you ever post to my Facebook or Twitter accounts without my permission?

A. No, never.

Q. How do I sign up to receive email communications from my Gates Notes account?

A. In Account Settings, click the toggle switch next to “Send me updates from Bill Gates.”

Q. How will you use the Interests I select in Account Settings?

A. We will use them to choose the Suggested Reads that appear on your profile page.

BACK
Forgot your password?
Enter the email you used to sign up and a reset password link will be sent to you.
This email is already registered. Enter a new email, try signing in or retrieve your password
Reset Password
Reset your password.
Set New Password
Your password has been reset. Please continue to the log in page.
Log in
Get emails from Bill Gates
Send me updates from Bill Gates
You must provide an email
On
Off
Email me comment notifications
On
Off
On-screen comment notifications
On
Off
This email is already registered
Finish
We will never share or spam your email address. For more information see our Sign up FAQ. By clicking "Continue" you agree to the Gates Notes Terms of Use / Privacy Policy.
You're in!
You're in!
Please check your email and click the link provided to verify your account.
Didn't get an email from us? Resend verification
Upload a profile picture
Choose image to upload
Uploading...
Uh Oh!
The image you are trying to upload is either too big or is an unacceptable format. Please upload a .jpg or .png image that is under 25MB.
Ok
Title
Mr
Mrs
Ms
Miss
Mx
Dr
Cancel
Save
This email is already registered
Cancel
Save
Please verify email address. Click verification link sent to this email address or resend verification email.
Email and notification settings
Send me updates from Bill Gates
You must provide an email
On
Off
Email me comment notifications
On
Off
On-screen comment notifications
On
Off
Select your interests
Saving Lives
Energy Innovation
Improving Education
Alzheimer's
Philanthropy
Book Reviews
About Bill Gates
Finish
Confirm Account Deactivation
Are you sure you want to deactivate your account?
Deactivating your account will unsubscribe you from Gates Notes emails, and will remove your profile and account information from public view on the Gates Notes. Please allow for 24 hours for the deactivation to fully process. You can sign back in at any time to reactivate your account and restore its content.
Deactivate My Acccount
Go Back
Your Gates Notes account has been deactivated.
Come back anytime.
Welcome back
In order to unsubscribe you will need to sign-in to your Gates Notes Insider account
Once signed in just go to your Account Settings page and set your subscription options as desired.
Sign In
Request account deletion
We’re sorry to see you go. Your request may take a few days to process; we want to double check things before hitting the big red button. Requesting an account deletion will permanently remove all of your profile content. If you’ve changed your mind about deleting your account, you can always hit cancel and deactivate instead.
Submit
Cancel
Thank You! Your request has been sent
Page https://www.gatesnotes.com:443/Health-innovations-and-investments-that-do-double-duty secs = 0.0156221