2009’s top 10 | 2010’s top 10 | 2011’s top 10 | 2012’s top 10 | 2013’s top 10 | 2014’s top 10 There are now 24 people assembling kits full-time at Pharmanova. Image credit: Simon Berry 2015 has been a real turning point. 2014 was a difficult year where we struggled to keep things going in Zambia, while we sought […]
The BMJ debate – ColaLife makes the case for partnership with multi-nationals
17 June 2015 by
ColaLife goes head to head with Prof Nick Spencer of Warwick University on involving multi-nationals in efforts to improve child health. Here is the BMJ’s press release announcing the debate. What do you think? Debate: Should we welcome multinational companies’ connection to projects to improve child health? Partnerships with multinational companies in child health programmes […]
The Zambia Report – Nov-14
27 November 2014 by
We are now back in the UK after a great 3 weeks in Zambia. So much happened, it felt we were there for 3 months. This blog post contains the details – the good things and the bad: The not so good (bad) Assembly of Kit Yamoyo by Pharmanova stopped in Oct-14 due to a […]
50,000th Kit Yamoyo sold to wholesalers
14 August 2014 by
I’ve just received the latest stock figures from Pharmanova, the manufacturer of Kit Yamoyo anti-diarrhoea kit in Zambia. Pharmanova report that they have shipped 51,000 Kit Yamoyo – anti-diarrhoea kits since we started the trial in Sep-12. As reported earlier, 26,230 kits were sold during the trial period (21,823 for vouchers and the remainder for cash). Now, […]
Sales rebound after Katete stock-out
5 August 2014 by
Even from back here in the UK, I’ve been aware of a Kit Yamoyo stock-out problem at the wholesaler in Katete and so I was relieved to get an email a couple of days ago from Elias Lungu in Katete saying how relieved (and happy) he was that stock had finally arrived (30 boxes of […]
Scale-up cranks up | Lusaka wholesalers in place
1 March 2014 by
Apologies for the fall in blogging rate. There’s been less than one a week since 1-Jan-14. For the moment blogging time has been swallowed up supporting requests to access our trial findings through our open access initiative. But that’s OK as it’s probably our most important dissemination activity right now. If you’d like access to […]
The ColaLife Innovation Map – Take 2
30 May 2013 by
I have written about the ColaLife Innovation Map before but it is time for an update. Peter Drucker, the late, famous American management consultant, educator, and author once said: “When a new venture does succeed, more often than not it is in a market other than the one it was originally intended to serve, with […]
Our concept for the distribution of medicines by rural retailers plays out in real life
23 March 2013 by
In November 2012 the rural health centres in Kalomo District in Zambia had not received ORS for several months due to a lack of stock at national level. In January, I visited one of these health centres and asked the Clinical Officer in charge if she’d received any ORS yet. She said they had received […]
Retailers buy by the box full
3 February 2013 by
When we were designing the ColaLife Trial in Zambia (COTZ), we agonised over the unit of sale to retailers. We had some information on the working capital that remote, rural retailers had. But not much. We finally settled on a pack size of one bag of 5 kits as the unit of sale to a […]
Getting the syphon going
12 October 2012 by
We are at a very exciting – albeit nerve-wracking – place just now right at the start of the trial. The situation we were in a few weeks ago, after our visit to see Chief Siachitema, is a really good metaphor for the situation we find ourselves in right now. Let me explain. As we […]
