About
Amref Health Africa is an African-led, African-staffed health nonprofit working across sub-Saharan Africa, and Amref Health Africa USA is its New York-based U.S. fundraising and partnership office, a registered 501(c)(3) organization (EIN 13-1867411). The organization began as the Flying Doctors, bringing surgical services to remote communities using light aircraft, and has since grown into what it describes as the largest Africa-based healthcare nonprofit, headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya, and serving millions of people annually across 35 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
Mission
Amref's stated mission is to catalyse and drive community-led and people-centered primary health care systems while addressing social determinants of health, in pursuit of its vision of lasting health change in Africa. The organization believes that change must come from the communities themselves, and it emphasizes that over 97% of its global staff are Africans.
What they do
Amref implements more than 150 projects across the African continent, with primary focus areas that include:
- Maternal and child health, addressing vulnerabilities arising from poverty, gender inequity, and gender-based violence, and working to prevent teenage pregnancy, female genital mutilation, and child marriage
- Training health workers, building capacity among community health workers, youth advocates, clinical officers, nurses, midwives, lab technicians and more
- Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), responding to the fact that 42% of the populations located across sub-Saharan Africa do not have access to safe water
- Medical outreach, including free surgical care, monitoring non-communicable diseases, and providing diagnostic services through laboratories
Notable projects include Kefeta (supporting Ethiopian youth), laboratory strengthening in South Sudan, childhood immunization, eLearning for midwife training in Uganda, and the Youth in Action (Y-ACT) initiative.
History
Amref Health Africa was officially founded in 1957 to deliver mobile health services and to provide mission hospitals with surgical support. Over the following decades it added ground-based mobile medical services and flight clinics (1960s), made training of rural health workers a major focus (1970s), and shifted toward community health development and health systems strengthening (1980s onward). Today the Amref family includes the global headquarters in Kenya plus offices across Africa, Europe, and North America, including the U.S. office in New York.
Financials
According to the organization, in 2022, 89% of funds raised went directly towards programming. Per IRS filings compiled by ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer, Amref Health Africa Inc (the U.S. entity) reported total revenue of $12,302,390 and total functional expenses of $11,442,364 for fiscal year 2023. The U.S. office publishes its audited financial statements and IRS Form 990s on its website.
Governance
The U.S. office is led by Chief Executive Officer Robert Kelty, with a board of directors chaired by Robert I. Wolk; William H. MacArthur serves as board treasurer. The IRS granted the U.S. entity its exemption ruling in 1961.