Adapting interventions to the public

Gold miners are the hardest hit by malaria. These populations live in difficult conditions in camps in the Amazon rainforest. They are illegal in French Guiana. Women are even more affected by this precarious situation, with many cases of prostitution. However, it is often these women who take care of the sick in the camps. It was therefore important to get their feedback on the care of people suffering from malaria in the forest.

We proposed a portrait workshop where a group of women could have their portrait painted in watercolors, with a female health agent translator and a female malaria project manager. The watercolor portraits took a fairly long time to complete (20-30 minutes), leaving plenty of time for conversation. The fact that the entire team was female also helped to build confidence, which in turn enabled us to broach other health-related subjects.