CIDRZ, in collaboration with the Republic of the Government of Zambian Ministry of Health and Ministry of Community Development, Mother and Child Health planned and introduced a programme of diarrhoeal disease control called, PAED  (Programme for the Awareness and Elimination of Diarrhoea) which was based on the World Health Organization 7 Point Plan. PAED had three main aims, one of which was based around caregiver and community behaviour change. LSHTM was engaged to provide research, intervention design and evaluation guidance for this arm of the PAED programme.

CIDRZ and LSHTM followed the Behaviour Centred Design approach to design a theory-based intervention. They conducted a formative research study to understand more about factors influencing practice of the four target behaviours (exclusive breastfeeding, handwashing with soap, and correct use of ORS and zinc to manage diarrhoea). The findings of this study were used to inform the design of the intervention to change caregiver behaviour to facilitate diarrhoea prevention and management for children under five years-of-age.

DDB Iris was given a creative brief detailing the four behaviours which the intervention should target and the campaign was developed. A theory-of-change model for the intervention was developed in parallel with the intervention content to illustrate the ways in which the intervention was hypothesised to lead to change. The theory of change was used to guide both intervention development and evaluation.