Just as illness can keep a poor person from working or going to school, so too can it cause a microfinance recipient to fall back on loan payments or default altogether. In rural communities, where people are exposed to more risks and have few options for health care, defaults can be linked in some cases to illness, which consumes available cash and makes the victim unable to work.  In response to this issue, in 2006 Freedom from Hunger launched the Microfinance and Health Protection (MAHP) initiative in rural Benin to help local partners create and sustain key health services that complement their credit offering. This program has the dual aim of protecting the household incomes of poor families and improving the ability of loan recipients to repay on time.

In Benin, IPA works with PADME and Freedom from Hunger to conduct an evaluation of the effectiveness of the MAHP initiative. The evaluation seeks to test: (1) The impact of providing three carefully designed Credit with Education health education modules (malaria, management of child heath, HIV/AIDS) on health and microfinance indicators over the course of a year; (2) The combined impact of that education with the provision of health care products such as mosquito nets and health education products; and (3) Specific aspects of the solidarity lending design used in the Credit with Education model.

The study employs two dimensions of randomization at the village level. In one level, half of the study participants (loan clients) are offered credit only and half are offered credit with health education. The health education consists of three modules: malaria education, integrated management of childhood diseases, and HIV/AIDS planning.  On another level, the study group is being randomized on the basis of whether female-only microcredit groups or mixed-gender microcredit groups are formed.