Caring for Laikipia: Borana’s Mobile Clinic continues its community support 

The Borana Mobile Clinic (BMC) is not your usual medical facility. It’s a well-travelled Land Rover, a pair of nurses with endless patience, and a driver who knows every road, shortcut, and suspiciously large pothole across the Laikipia landscape. Together, they bring essential healthcare directly to the communities living around Borana Conservancy. Reliable, accessible healthcare that would otherwise be hours away. 

Bringing essential healthcare to communities in northern Kenya 

 The Borana, Maasai, Meru, Samburu, and Turkana tribes who share this landscape have shaped it for generations and their wellbeing is central to the future of the area. When access to clinics is limited by distance, cost, or time away from the household, treatable illnesses can escalate, with routine care slipping through the cracks. By bringing healthcare directly to people’s homes and villages, the BMC helps ensure that families stay healthy, resilient and able to keep participating in the daily work that sustains both community life and conservation programmes. 

Healthcare services provided by Borana’s Mobile Clinic 

Each month, the clinic sees more than 700 people across ten communities. Children are immunised on time, expectant mothers receive antenatal care, and families get practical guidance on nutrition, hygiene and preventing common illnesses. Family-planning advice helps households plan their futures with more stability, whilst HIV testing and counselling offer vital early support. These small, regular interventions reduce preventable illness and strengthen the foundations of community life. 

Supporting young people through education and advice 

The clinic is also helping respond to rising teenage pregnancies in the region. Although Kenyan law prevents contraception being supplied to those under eighteen, the team has created safe spaces for open discussion with students, teachers and parents. The focus is on clear, honest information, helping young people make informed decisions and giving families confidence to communicate about a subject that is often difficult to navigate. 

Building local healthcare and First Aid skills 

This past year, the BMC expanded its focus on building local skills. Thirty community members completed First Aid Responder training courses, with twelve more trained to pass these skills on to others. In collaboration with Dharura: Global Emergency Care, 35 community members and eight healthcare workers were trained to manage emergencies such as trauma, cardiac arrest and pre-eclampsia. In remote areas, this knowledge can be lifesaving, as professional help can often take too long to arrive. 

Borana Mobile Clinic: Healthcare impact in 2024–2025 

Between July 2024 and June 2025, 8,967 individuals received treatment or advice from the BMC, with the clinic delivering: 

•  1,278 family-planning consultations 
• 1,020 child immunisations 
• 474 antenatal check-ups 
• 3,240 deworming tablets to schoolchildren 
• 1,371 malnutrition screenings 
• 1,465 tests and counselling sessions for individuals affected by HIV 

How access to healthcare supports stronger communities 

A family with access to healthcare is more secure. When parents can seek treatment early, they miss fewer days of work. When children are healthy, they stay in school and continue their education without interruption. Families are less likely to be forced into selling livestock, leaving farmland untended, or exhausting their savings to cover medical costs. That stability matters. Good healthcare acts as a buffer, protecting a family’s time, income and energy, and allowing them to respond to change without being overwhelmed by it. 

The link between community healthcare and conservation 

Long-term conservation depends on trust, stability, and shared responsibility. The BMC supports all three. By easing everyday challenges and strengthening community resilience, the clinic helps ensure that the people who have looked after these landscapes for generations can continue to do so. It is a practical reminder that conservation is not only about protecting wildlife, but also investing in the wellbeing of the people who live alongside them. 

Thank you to the Borana Mobile Clinic’s supporters 

Save the Rhino International and the team at Borana Conservancy wish to extend their deepest thanks to its donors, including the CHK Foundation, for their ongoing and long-term support of the BMC. This generosity has been instrumental in providing thousands of people across northern Kenya with vital healthcare, education and training that would otherwise be out of reach. We are so grateful for their continued commitment to holistic conservation and to the people who make the stewardship of this remarkable landscape possible.