‘We wondered what had happened’: how Malawi lost healthcare in US aid cuts

Clinics providing services such as antenatal checkups have begun to disappear in one of the world's poorest countries

A blue, burgundy and white patterned wrapper hides the swell of Joanna Banda's belly. At eight months pregnant, she has had just three of the five antenatal appointments she should have had. She is unlikely to attend her final three either, as she still has to save 3,000 kwacha (1.28) for a bicycle to take her six miles on rutted dirt tracks to the nearest health centre when she goes into labour.

In remote villages in Malawi, pregnant women like 22-year-old Banda, who has one child after losing her first soon after giving birth, are struggling to get the medical care they need. In January, US aid cuts abruptly ended a rural healthcare outreach programme that had started to cut the number of women dying in childbirth.