When society makes kids vulnerable
manner. In this characterisation, the children of Survivors live in unsanitary conditions, on the remote fringes of a village making access to care much more difficult. Survivors are unable to properly care for the child once she returns home after an episode of illness. In a Conservative family, tradition defines the kind of care a child receives and the mother has little power to decide when to seek care. For the Strivers, the mother has no time to follow the given advice and often delays seeking care until the child is seriously ill. The Potentials make repeated mistakes in taking care of the child because they fail to recognise the specific risks that they are exposing the child to.
Once a health worker identifies the closest type to which a family belongs, she is able to rapidly deploy the tools necessary to address the specific social vulnerability being experienced by the family. In this example, for Survivors, it is clear that income support from the government is a must; for the Conservatives, identifying the true decision-makers within the household and then working with them to develop new norms of behaviour would be essential; for the Strivers, offering them time efficient tools and social support is key; whereas for the Potentials, drawing their attention to specific risks associated with their existing childcare practices would be very important instead of offering generalised advice. The Pilots can be relied upon to act as role models where appropriate, and to support the health worker in helping to address the specific challenges being faced by the other families.
This is only one example of a grouping that could be employed in the field. The key here is to offer groups of community health workers sufficient training and support so that they are able to create their own typologies and related heuristics, allowing them to respond rapidly with targeted guidance instead of taking a more generalised and uniform approach towards families under their care.
Nachiket Mor and Tracy Johnson work with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The views expressed are personal