Community empowerment, the process by which people meaningfully participate in decisions affecting their lives, is of particular relevance for the fight against neglected tropical diseases (NTDs). As Sophie highlighted in her blog, NTDs tend to affect those living in low-income countries with low levels of development, meaning that community empowerment interventions which build up health, as well as social and political infrastructure, are likely to have benefits beyond the treatment or eradication of jus
By adopting a community empowerment approach to NTD intervention a group of people can be equipped with the knowledge and resources to tackle not just one disease, but many other medical and social problems. As Shalin pointed out in her blog last month, community approaches to health have antecedents in the grassroots political and social movements of the second half of the twentieth century, and today organisations such as Citizens UK , the group behind the Living Wage campaign, work to build the capaciti
Among the challenges here are issues with procuring an initial investment, a hesitation to trust local communities with their own decision-making and the inefficiencies resulting from competition for resources between small, unco-ordinated initiatives (inefficiencies that a community empowerment approach could help address). How do national governments and NGOs identify efficient infrastructure-building interventions that will achieve sustainable, long-term results and also contribute to capacity-building i