Health
WHAT WE DO
Improving health and strengthening livelihoods through community-based care.
Good health is the foundation for a thriving life — yet for families living in poverty, it is often out of reach. Every year, unexpected medical costs and preventable dieases push more than one billion people deeper into poverty, erasing hard-won progress and forcing impossible choices between healthcare and survival.
Leveraging our network of existing and new Microfinance Institutions, Opportunity trains women entrepreneurs as Community Health Leaders who educate families on hygiene, nutrition, and disease prevention. They connect neighbours with health services and distribute essential health products while earning an income.
How we create opportunity through the health program.
1. Donations are received from generous donors. A small loan gives a woman the opportunity to start a business and improve the lives of her family members with increased income.
2. Training is offered for women who want to become health leaders in the community. This includes six months of training on essential healthcare and sanitation.
3. During training, leaders pinpoint pressing needs within their communities, understanding the problems and crafting effective solutions.
4. Families are reached in the local community as the new health leader shares her skills and knowledge with up to 200 households over six months.
5. Community health improves as essential health and hygiene knowledge is shared and sanitization practices are improved within the community.
Our impact in health.
Last year, 376,500 people across Bangladesh, India, and Nepal gained access to health education and care through our We Care program — where trained women serve as frontline health workers in their own communities, connecting families to services that would otherwise be out of reach.
CLIENT STORY
Empowering her community through awareness
Anshu grew up in Bihar’s Nalanda district with little formal education and no access to trusted health information. During her early pregnancies, the absence of basic health knowledge led to multiple losses and severe complications. “If I had known what I know today, much of my suffering could have been prevented,” she says.
That painful experience became her purpose. Through Community Health Worker training with Opportunity’s partner CDOT, Anshu gained comprehensive knowledge of reproductive health, antenatal care, and danger sign recognition — and the confidence to share it. Today she actively educates women in her village, dispels harmful myths, and encourages timely care-seeking, drawing on her own story to build the trust that changes behaviour.
Anshu is a powerful example of what becomes possible when local women are equipped with knowledge: stronger health systems, shifting social norms, and communities where fewer families endure the losses she once did.