Miles of Smiles Foundation calls upon willing organizations, groups of people, individuals with the desire to support children, adolescents and youth living with chronic illnesses to donate towards the construction of the Smiles Center so that they can further their work in improving the quality of life of children, adolescents and youth living with chronic illnesses by the use of peer led interventions to provide treatment, psychosocial and skilling support.
The Smiles Center will be located in a town called Semuto in Nakaseke district in Uganda and it will include:
- Accommodation in dormitories and cottage-style facilities to facilitate residential activities including camps.
- Conference rooms to allow for in-door sessions.
- A recording studio and an art gallery to facilitate storytelling and talent growth.
- Turf to facilitate sports engagements including yearly tournaments.
- Gazebos to facilitate one-on-one and group peer counseling.
- A microfinance institute to offer financial literacy and products that support youth living with chronic illnesses.
- An office block for administration purposes.
- Farming space to ensure availability of food at the center at little to no cost.
- Your generous contribution is welcome.
About Miles of Smiles Foundation.
Founded in 2012 by the 2016 Queens Young Leaders Award winner Josephine Nabukenya, a youth living with HIV, and formally registered as an NGO in Uganda in 2020 by Josephine and a team of four (Kisoma Eddie, Brian Ahimbisibwe, Lubega Kizza and Raymond Nsobani Niyibizi). Miles of Smiles works towards ensuring healthy smiling children, adolescents and young people living with chronic illnesses in Uganda. Chronic illnesses currently focused on include HIV, Tuberculosis, Sickle cell Disease, Diabetes and Cardiovascular Diseases. Over the years, Miles of Smiles Foundation has been able to accomplish its goal of existence through a number of efforts:
- From 2017 to 2019, the foundation supported 15 health facilities and organizations to provide HIV-friendly services to youth and conducted 5 Warrior’s camps for adolescents and youth living with HIV who were facing adherence challenges and had a high viral load with a goal of achieving and maintain viral load suppression.
- From 2020 to 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the foundation provided basic needs to families of children, adolescents, and youth living with both HIV and disabilities with funding from the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust. The foundation supported over 150 families with food, soap, face masks, and delivery of ARVs during the country-wide lockdown.
- From 2022 to 2024, the foundation conducted 3 Warrior’s camps still focusing on adolescents facing adherence challenges totaling to 8 camps since 2017 and achieved over 90% viral load suppression among its 312 campers thus far.
- The foundation has also developed a mobile application called MO-smiles to offer e-peer support to adolescents and youth living with chronic illnesses by providing treatment and clinical appointment reminders, access to chat rooms with peers living with similar health conditions, a map of other health-related services within their community, and health information including stories of other youth and how they are thriving in life regardless of their health conditions.
The foundation looks forward to partnering with you on this amazing journey of community transformation.
Website link: https://mosmiles.org
Organiser
Raymond Nsobani
Organiser