On Day 2 of its three day visit to Kenya the CARE/CSIS delegation divided in two, with one group led by Helene Gayle and including Congressman Keith Ellison, heading north to Nyanza Province in northwestern Kenya. Nyanza is one of Kenya’s poorest areas with 63% of the population living on less than $1 a day. The province has the highest HIV prevalence rate in Kenya (14%), a significant burden of malarial disease and among the lowest life expectancies in the country – according to the director of the district hospital, age 43 for women and 37 for men. Household economies are largely supported by subsistence farming and fishing along the shores of Lake Victoria. However, Nyanza has been hard-hit by Kenya’s current drought, with both maize and sorghum harvests considerably constrained, posing further nutritional challenges at the household level.
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