BAMA USA Board Member Hsuan Lo in Uganda
In December 2025, our BAMA USA Board Member Hsuan Lo visited the BAMA team during her business trip to Uganda. What a great opportunity to finally see the work first-hand, meet the team, learn from the experts, and visit partner facilities.
Read about her experience below and follow her journey here on YouTube:
“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.”
2025 was not an easy year—and yet it taught me more than many others. My deeper involvement with BAMA this year became a vivid epitome of that truth. As cliché as it may sound, I have come to understand resilience, perseverance, and humility not as abstract virtues, but as lived, deeply personal experiences.
In the wake of the USAID fallout, BAMA was pushed to the edge. At the time, many organizations—particularly those operating at scale—respond with funding cuts, layoffs, or program shutdowns. BAMA, however, turned itself around within a matter of months. This speaks not only to organizational agility, but more fundamentally to resilience rooted in strong institutional character and a management team with a deeply adaptive mindset. In a strategic reflection session, team members openly recounted the challenges they faced and distilled the lessons that would shape the path forward. I was struck by how forward-leaning their ideas were, yet how firmly grounded they remained in the team’s collective strengths—qualities that I believe position BAMA well as the global development landscape continues to shift.
Perseverance showed up in how the team continued to deliver despite sustained pressure at both the organizational and country levels. Results were not only maintained but, in many cases, exceeded expectations. This was driven by a high level of professionalism and consistency in execution. These qualities cannot be fully captured in reports or slide decks. Instead, they reveal themselves in moments of human interaction: the spark in someone’s eyes when exploring a new idea; the confidence and resolve in negotiations with funders; the long nights spent pushing work forward; the genuine enthusiasm that surfaces when the mission is discussed; and the respect and praise consistently voiced by government partners.
I witnessed these moments repeatedly during just a few days spent with the team in Masaka. Together, they reflect a collective determination to ensure that the arrival of a child brings joy and hope to a family—not fear or loss.
Take-aways
Finally, there is the profound humility that has grown within me through working with this team and witnessing what they accomplish against such difficult odds. Imagine operating in an environment where meeting even the most basic conditions is itself a daily challenge—where essential medications are scarce, health personnel are stretched thin, and facilities lack sufficient beds. And yet, safe deliveries continue. Lives are protected. Progress is made. What impressed me most was the clarity and ownership with which the team approached problems. The solutions were locally generated, practical, and tied directly to the realities on the ground. I consistently found myself learning from the team’s judgment and execution, and gaining a deeper appreciation for the importance of listening to those closest to the work. The deepest wisdom resides with those who understand their context intimately, who serve their communities with clarity of purpose, and whose will cannot be bent.
As someone who also works in global health, this experience has reinforced the standards I want to hold myself to: resilience in uncertainty, perseverance in execution despite challenges, and humility in recognizing where the most relevant insight and leadership often reside.
