Cannes Lions

Mother Blanket

OGILVY COLOMBIA, Bogota / VIVIR ASSOCIATION + AMBATO'S CANTONAL HUMAN RIGHTS PROTECTION COUNCIL / 2020

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Overview

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Overview

Background

There are over 300.000 children in the Andean communes struggling with chronic undernourishment. The vast majority of mothers aren´t aware of this health problem until it´s too late. Malnutrition in babies comes with irretrievable adulthood consequences and early deaths.

Idea

Mother Blanket is a reinvented *Sikinchi that translates the OMS Infant Growth Chart into a cultural appropriate pediatric evaluation tool, that helps Andean Mothers keep track of their babies correct development. In order to fight chronic undernourishment in Andean communes, we create a didactic tool – in native Quichwa and Spanish – that teaches Andean mothers how to identify if correct baby development.

*Cultural swaddling blanket that Andean mothers have been using for centuries to carry their babies.

Strategy

By adapting the OMS Infant Growth Chart into a daily use object, we give unaware Andean mothers the knowledge to identify if their babies are developing correctly, and the opportunity to visualize how their babies growth should look like according to their age.

Andean Qhichwa Mothers play a very active rol in Andean Communes. Their daily activities includes farming, taking care of the house and raising their babies. Most of them are quite young when motherhood comes, and the vast majority aren't prepared for the demanding experience.

By giving Andean Mothers the opportunity to track their babies development we could change the perspectives that Andean Quichwa Ecuadorians will have in their futures.

Mother Blankets alarm Andean Mothers, in their native language, if their babies are developing correctly and if not, we teach them to visit the village medic right away.

Execution

In the distant Commune of Guangaje in the Cotopaxi Province on the Central Andes of Ecuador, with the join collaboration of Vivir Association and Ambato´s Cantonal Human Rights Protection Council, we gave Mother Blankets to every mother of a infant baby as a gift to be used as a *Sikinchi. Every time the Mother Blanket was given, we taught Andean Mothers how to use measure their babies and warned them to visit the Commune Health Center in case their baby’s growth didn´t went as it should be.

*Cultural swaddling blanket that Andean mothers have been using for centuries to carry their babies.

Outcome

· Over 15.000 chronic cases identified over the first three months.

· 70% increase in pediatric visits in isolated Andean communes.