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Powering Health

Electrification Options for Developing Country Health Facilities

Water Pumping

Clean water is an essential input for proper health facility operation. Electrification of health facilities provides an excellent opportunity to pump clean water to the facility.

The following case study provides information on a solar powered clean water project at a health facility in Uganda.

Six boys fill small water bottles from a spigot at the edge of a field.

Power for Water

In Uganda, diarrheal diseases are responsible for 17% of deaths for children under 5 and account for 30,000 deaths per year in all age groups. In addition, families spend countless hours each day transporting water from source to point-of-use locations. In the conflict-affected regions in the North, the daily trek to get water increases the vulnerability of women to attack.


Flag of Uganda. Six equal horizontal bands of black (top), yellow, red, black, yellow, and red; a white disk is superimposed at the center and depicts a red-crested crane (the national symbol) facing the hoist side.

Kalungi Hospital Water and Electrification Project

Kalungi Hospital is located 125 kilometers south of Kampala, Uganda, off the Kampala-Masaka Highway. The facility serves as both a health clinic and a nursing school; nurses who complete the Kalungi program are deployed into village hospitals. The hospital has a seven person staff with one medical assistant. The clinic sees 20 to 30 patients daily; this number increases to about 50 during malaria season. Some patients can pay a small fee of roughly 400 shillings, or 22 cents.