Community Health
Rieko endeavors to empower the community to make their own better choices about their healthcare.

Through the use of community health workers, local and international partners, and our health volunteers and health interns, we go into the communities and use interactive education techniques to ensure that community members make their own choices about their health.

Our syllabus is varied, from promotion of cleanliness and sanitary living, and water sterilization, to encouraging women to ante natal classes, under 5’s for immunizations, and for women to deliver in a medical facility rather than at home.

Water Sterilization
Clean water is a basic necessity of life, and something that every person should have access to. In Kenya it is a different story. Thousands of people around the lake region use the lake, or rural residents use the nearest rivers/ponds, as a means of washing themselves, their clothes, their pots and pans, and then even use the lake water for drinking as well. Many people have been found not to even be boiling and/or sterilizing the water before consuming causing significant health issues. The reason being mainly down to lack of education and in some instances, ignorance.  

Rieko’s water sterilization program focuses both on education and physical workshops on sterilizing water techniques. A variety of methods can be used, either in combination or standalone, however the result is the same – safe drinking water, which prevents further health issues. If you would like to assist us in this field, check out our water sterilization volunteer program.  

Access to Toilets – Defecation Free Zones
To date, thousands of people across Kenya use the wide outdoors as their area in which to defecate. Mostly this is down to lack of funds to build proper toilets, however occasionally this is down to ignorance. What people fail to realize that, through open-air defecation, their waste ends up back in their food chain. Something very unpleasant to think about, not only a severe health risk.

Rieko works with community health workers to ensure that every community is educated of the health risks of defecating in non-allocated areas, and aims to ensure that every compound/household has a toilet. Rieko are always looking for public health volunteers to assist our community health workers create defecation-free zones as well as educate the communities regarding other health risks relating to them.

Adequate Housing & Shelter
Part of Rieko’s programs include identifying persons/families which do not have adequate shelter and no means of fixing this. Far too often the elderly, disabled, orphaned or widowed are left homeless after they do not have enough funds to fix their homes, and they fall into significant disrepair. Rieko aims to help these people, and uses its home construction volunteering program to assist them.