News

September 10th, 2026

Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report: Causes of Death Among Stillbirths and Children Aged <5 Years in Africa and South Asia — Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance, Seven Countries, 2016–2024.

Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia have the highest rates of stillbirths and rates of death among children aged <5 years, with many countries in those regions unlikely to meet the 2030 goal of ending preventable deaths among newborns and children aged <5 years. Conventional mortality surveillance (determining cause of death through interviews with family members or caregivers [i.e., verbal autopsy] and vital registration) in areas with high mortality often lacks laboratory confirmation of causes and incompletely identifies maternal contributors and comorbid conditions, providing information that is insufficiently specific to guide prevention efforts.

April 16th, 2026

Data Dissemination Levers: Engaging Partners and Stakeholders to translate CHAMPS data into actionable public health policies and interventions – Two success stories at the CHAMPS SL Site

For years, Sierra Leone’s efforts to tackle childhood malnutrition through the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) initiative were hampered by a critical gap: the absence of localized, country-specific data. While malnutrition was recognized as a primary threat to child survival, the lack of evidence made it nearly impossible for the government to strategically allocate resources or design targeted interventions. This case study explores how the Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS) program bridged this evidence-to-policy gap.

March 11th, 2026

CHAMPS 10th Advisory Committee Meeting: CHAMPS Data Drives Urgent Health Policy Action in Sierra Leone.

New evidence from the CHAMPS program in Sierra Leone shows that 70% of child deaths in Sierra Leone could be prevented, while 77% of deaths were misdiagnosed in clinical settings, highlighting urgent gaps in the country’s health system and the need for data-driven policy reforms. These findings were presented at the 10th CHAMPS Advisory Committee Meeting, held in Makeni under the theme “Beyond Data: Confronting the Hidden Epidemics in our Health System.”

February 12th, 2026

Intern Spotlight | Adewole Odunayo Grace: Shaping the Future of Research.

Last summer, the CHAMPS Sierra Leone team was joined by Adewole Odunayo Grace, an intern from the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Rwanda. Specializing in Mathematical Epidemiology, Grace spent three months (May 15 – August 31, 2025) applying her technical background to public health surveillance. Her work focused on using mathematical modeling to better understand health patterns and support data-driven decision-making within the network. In this spotlight, Grace shares her experience transitioning from the classroom to the field and the insights she gained while working on the ground in Sierra Leone.

August 1st, 2025

CHAMPS Translating findings from child mortality audits into life-saving interventions: CHAMPS Sierra Leone success story.

In 2021, there were 104.7 deaths per 1,000 live births among children under the age of 5 in Sierra Leone (1). From the Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS) findings of 610 minimally invasive tissue sampling (MITS) cases reviewed from February 2019 to December 2022, the determination of cause of death (DeCoDe) expert panel determined that 72% of deaths were preventable. Of these, 1 in 3 deaths could have been prevented by improving clinical management of cases. A majority (87%) of the reviewed MITS cases were regional facility deaths, underpinning the importance of auditing the clinical management of cases in these facilities.

July 30th, 2024

Enhancing Healthcare Referral Systems to improve maternal and birth outcomes and reduce under-5 mortality – CHAMPS catchment areas, Sierra Leone, 2023-2024

The healthcare referral system in the Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS) catchment areas, Bombali District, Sierra Leone is inefficient, resulting in delayed and inappropriate care for patients. This case study showcases the implementation and impact of the CHAMPS Data-to-Action project in improving the referral system from peripheral health units (PHUs, primary level of care) to the district hospital (secondary level of care).

July 6th, 2022

New CHAMPS Research Laboratory Commissioned in Sierra Leone

On July 21, 2022, members of the CHAMPS Sierra Leone site team gathered with local and international partners to celebrate the official opening of a new clinical research laboratory at the Makeni Regional Government Hospital. Built in partnership with the CDC…

January 29th, 2018

Sierra Leone Joins CHAMPS’ Global Network!

Sierra Leone joins CHAMPS as the seventh site, adding new West African partners to the global CHAMPS network of over 100+ partners. Sierra Leone has some of the highest rates of child mortality in the world, and as a CHAMPS site will have access to life saving data and resources to address this dire public health challenge.

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