Teaching Malaria Prevention to Millions Through Mobile-First Animation
With over five million Zimbabweans living in malaria-endemic areas, the Zimbabwe Assistance Program in Malaria (ZAPIM) needed health education that could cut through literacy barriers and reach people where they are – on their phones. Nafuna Africa created a series of mobile-optimised animations in English, Shona, and Ndebele that turned prevention guidelines into relatable, character-driven stories.
The Full Story
Context & challenge
Traditional IEC materials struggled to stick: long pamphlets, dense workshops, and static posters. ZAPIM wanted a format rural communities would actually watch and share.
Our approach
We designed short 2D animated episodes featuring everyday Zimbabwean families navigating real malaria risk scenarios, storyboarded for mobile screens first.
Impact & results
Distributed through Econet Wireless to an audience of 9 million subscribers, the animations helped train hundreds of health workers and supported the distribution of 1.6 million bed nets, with significant declines in malaria incidence across 15 high-burden districts.
Bring us the difficult brief.
We turn ambitious creative concepts into visible, accountable delivery paths.