Amina Yahya

A Sudanese midwife who revolutionized maternal healthcare in rural Africa through mobile clinics.

Amina Yahya (1915–1999) was a Sudanese midwife and public health innovator who transformed childbirth practices across East Africa. Born in Khartoum, she trained as a midwife during British colonial rule and later worked in remote villages, where she observed high maternal mortality rates due to lack of access to care. In 1952, she pioneered the "camel mobile clinics"—medical teams traveling on camels to reach nomadic communities in Darfur and Kordofan regions.

Yahya's Community Health Worker Model, documented in her book Bridging the Desert: A Midwife's Journey, became a blueprint for WHO's rural healthcare strategies. She trained over 500 local women as birth attendants, reducing postpartum hemorrhage deaths by 70% in her service areas. Despite facing opposition from traditional healers, she collaborated with UNICEF to establish Sudan's first midwifery college in 1968.

Her work inspired the World Health Organization's Health for All initiative. In 2002, the Amina Yahya Award was created to honor African healthcare pioneers. Her legacy is preserved in the Sudanese Health Heritage Archive.