Short messages that save lives

Maisha is a collection of short, practical messages about health and safety. The messages are designed to be printed, read aloud, sent by SMS, or shared on the radio.

Each message fits on a small piece of paper. Each one can be understood the first time you hear it. Each one could prevent death or serious harm.

Why short messages

When someone is sick or hurt, there is often no time to search for information. A message on a wall, heard on the radio, or remembered from a conversation can make the difference.

Short messages travel. They pass from person to person. They stay in memory. They work when phones have no signal and when clinics are far away.

Why print, SMS, and radio

Many places in the world do not have reliable internet. Hospitals and clinics may be hours away. Emergency services may be unavailable or overloaded.

In these places, information travels by paper, by voice, by text message. Maisha is built for these channels. The messages are written to work without images, without apps, without electricity.

A poster on a clinic wall. A message read on community radio. A text forwarded between neighbors. These are reliable ways to share knowledge where formal systems cannot always reach.

Where Maisha is most useful

Maisha is designed for places where:

This includes much of Sub-Saharan Africa, parts of South Asia, rural areas, displacement camps, and communities recovering from crisis.

A note for readers in high-resource settings

If you live somewhere with accessible healthcare, trained emergency responders, and reliable communication systems, Maisha messages are not meant to replace the guidance available to you.

Your local emergency services, health departments, and medical professionals will give you more precise and appropriate advice for your context. In these settings, Maisha is informational only. Please follow local guidance first.

How to use this site