The bicycle ambulance, locally known as Dagadaga, is designed to carry patients who cannot sit upright. It can be attached to a bicycle or motorcycle, allowing patients to lie down during the journey.
By Liam Josh
When labour pains began, Sheila Charles Mborikina knew she needed to reach a health facility. But the nearest facility was about five kilometres away, and she had no reliable means of transport.
Her husband had neither a motorcycle nor a bicycle. An ambulance was not readily available.
For Sheila, five kilometres suddenly felt like an impossible distance.
“I might have delivered at home if the Amal Ride was not there,” she says.
Instead, she was transported to a health facility using the community-based Amal Ride, a bicycle ambulance service designed to help people who cannot easily reach healthcare facilities on their own.
She arrived safely and delivered her baby.
Today, Sheila holds her child in her arms, grateful that transport was available when she needed it most.
“For us in Bazungua, the Amal Ride has become a lifeline,” she says, describing the journey that can determine whether care is reached in time
Across Bazungua Payam, poor roads, long distances and limited household incomes can turn access to healthcare into a major challenge.
For pregnant women, people living with disabilities, older people and seriously ill patients, the journey to a health facility can be particularly difficult.
In emergencies, the problem is not necessarily the absence of healthcare. It can be the inability to reach it.
Victor Zakapu, the youth leader in Bazungua, says the community previously had few options for transporting people who were too sick or physically unable to travel on ordinary motorcycles or bicycles.
“Before this, we did not have anything like this to help patients who needed transportation to health facilities,” Zakapu says.
The bicycle ambulance, locally known as Dagadaga, is designed to carry patients who cannot sit upright. It can be attached to a bicycle or motorcycle, allowing patients to lie down during the journey.
According to Zakapu, the service has already transported eight people, including a pregnant woman, a person living with a disability and a man suffering from an illness affecting his hand and leg.
For Luka, transport meant finally reaching treatment
For 32-year-old Luka Godwill, the service became critical when both of his legs became severely swollen, leaving him unable to stand or walk.
“I could not move on my feet. I had no way of standing up or going to the health facility,” Luka recalls.
For nearly two weeks, he says, he remained seriously ill without a reliable means of reaching medical care.
Then members of the Amal Ride service found him.
“I was carried using the Amal Ride to the hospital. When I reached the hospital, I received treatment immediately,” he says.
Luka says the service has changed the way people in the community respond to medical emergencies.
“Whenever there is an emergency, it responds immediately and helps us reach the health facility,” he says.
The journey, however, is not always easy.
Rough roads and hills can make bicycle transportation slow, while travelling on a motorcycle can be uncomfortable for patients experiencing severe pain.
Luka says the Amal Ride gave him a more comfortable way to travel.
“With Amal Ride, you feel comfortable. It is almost like lying on your bed at home. You do not feel the same pain while being transported,” he says.
He believes the service could become even more effective with motorbike support, particularly when emergencies occur on difficult terrain.
Bridging the gap between healthcare and communities
The Amal Ride is implemented by Men 4 Women, with support from UNFPA through Amref Health Africa, as part of efforts to address transportation barriers to healthcare in communities such as Bazungua.
For Sheila, the importance of the service is especially clear for pregnant women.
She recalls cases in which women have had to walk long distances, give birth at home or even deliver along the road because their families could not afford transportation to a health facility.
“Before Amal Ride came to our community, life was very difficult for us,” she says.
Data Gordon of Men 4 Women says the initiative is intended to reduce delays in accessing healthcare, particularly during emergencies.
“For us at Men 4 Women, this initiative is about preventing avoidable delays in accessing healthcare. When a woman is in labour or someone is facing a medical emergency, every minute matters. Reliable transport can help ensure that distance, poverty or lack of other means of transport does not prevent people from reaching care in time.”
A simple solution facing a bigger challenge
A beneficiary of the bicycle ambulance. [Photo: Courtesy]
Community leaders say the need extends beyond the people already reached by the service.
Zakapu is calling for continued support from donors and development partners, including assistance to provide a motorcycle that could help expand the service.
“We request the donors to continue helping Men 4 Women so that they can help us,” he says.
He also wants similar transportation support extended to other communities and bomas across Yambio County.
The demand highlights a broader challenge facing rural communities: building a health facility is only one part of making healthcare accessible. People must also be able to reach it.
For families in Bazungua, the question is often not whether healthcare exists.
It is whether they can get there before it is too late.
For Sheila, the journey ended at a health facility and, ultimately, with the safe arrival of her baby.
For Luka, it meant receiving treatment after his condition had left him unable to walk.
The bicycle ambulance may be a simple piece of equipment. But in Bazungua, its value is measured in the journeys it makes possible — and in the patients who are able to reach care when they need it most.
“The Amal Ride did not simply transport me to a health facility,” Sheila says. “It helped me reach care safely when I needed it most.”