Kampala — THE Straight Talk Foundation, in partnership with the UN children's agency (UNICEF), has distributed 5,339 radios to the communities in Karamoja sub-region.

Straight Talk project manager Martin Oenen said on Thursday that the organisation got concerned about the plight of communities in Karamoja and requested UNICEF for support. UNICEF sent the consignment.

Oenen said there was need to have the communities' capacity building strengthened by delivering adequate information on health and education, because the Karimojong have for so long been cattle-centred.

"We wanted the communities to be able to listen to programmes so that they can follow up the one-month child survival campaign which has been concluded," Oenen said.

UNICEF has been running a child survival campaign in the sub-region, which carried a holistic approach that encompassed children and mother survival.

Alisen Okot, 42, a resident of Loputuk village and a beneficiary of the radios, said she had heard a lot about several preventable diseases.

"I now spend most of my time hooked to the radio and I do not feel like drinking alcohol," Okot said.

UNICEF chief field officer Dr Narinder Sharma said the radio distribution was designed to expand the coverage of high impact and life-saving interventions for children and women in Karamoja.

"We have an enormous opportunity to make a big difference for Karamoja children by rapidly scaling up the major child survival interventions in the sub-region," Sharma said.

"Nearly 100 children under the age of five die every week from preventable causes in Karamoja. Therefore, there is need for concerted and sustained action to reduce disparities in the region which stem-up high levels of disease and death of children," he added. Sharma said UNICEF was already making gains in the sub-region alongside other partners.