When Tracy Ahumuza gave birth to her daughter, Alyssa, in April 2021, nothing unfolded as she had imagined.
Alyssa needed surgery and could take only breastmilk, yet Ahumuza’s milk had not come in.
Three days later, Alyssa died. In the fog of grief, Tracy’s milk began to flow. Wanting another baby to live, she searched for a safe, screened way to donate, but she found none.
That gap became her mission. From personal loss, the ATTA Breastmilk Community took root.
Founded in mid-2021 and named after Alyssa Taha and Tracy Ahumuza, ATTA began as a simple milk-sharing network connecting donors and recipients.
It quickly evolved. Tracy learnt that well-meaning sharing can be risky. Untested milk may transmit disease, poor handling can erase its life-saving value, and clinical guidance is essential.
Thus, ATTA adopted a rigorous model, screening and testing donors, training them in safe expression and storage, maintaining a cold-chain for collection and transport, and dispensing milk only on medical advice to infants in greater need.
Early days
In June 2021, an urgent call came from a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit; a newborn needed donor milk.
Tracy shared the appeal widely; within hours, her former schoolmate Asha Nakiganda volunteered.
Asha had once received a blood donation and had nursed a sick newborn. She knew the feeling of helplessness. Her gift restored hope to a desperate family and seeded a community.
Another mother started with “really small bags,” then steadily increased as her supply responded, helping other infants survive while exclusively breastfeeding her own for six months.
“The more she donated, the more milk she made,” Tracy recalls.
In those first weeks, she did everything, arranging tests, finding safe transport, and driving late-night deliveries, including one through heavy rain to reach the father of preterm triplets while their mother battled postpartum depression. Those triplets are now three.
Building for safety and sustained impact
Demand soon outpaced improvisation. To protect babies, donors, and families, ATTA Breastmilk Community needed infrastructure: pasteurisation, reliable storage, trained staff, and standard operating procedures.
That required money, often tens of thousands of dollars, and stamina.
Tracy carried ATTA Breastmilk Community while working full-time and carrying grief. Many nights, she considered quitting.
Crowdfunding and generous supporters funded a small pasteurizer, enabling ATTA to shift from informal sharing to a milk-bank model with screening, pasteurization, storage, and transport standards, and formal hospital partnerships.
By 2024, ATTA had collected and dispensed about 600 litres of donor milk to more than 400 newborns.
On average, the team supports around 15 babies at a time, a number that fluctuates as infants are admitted, stabilised, and discharged.
The “bridge” to breastfeeding
Some clinicians were initially skeptical. Breastfeeding is standard advice; donor milk banks were largely unfamiliar in Uganda.
ATTA aligned its protocols with medical guidance, ensured comprehensive screening for transmissible diseases, and prioritised premature, low-birth-weight, and medically fragile infants.
Donor milk is positioned as a bridge to breastfeeding, not a replacement.
ATTA Breastmilk Community trains health workers and educates families on expression, storage, handling, and transport, helps mothers establish or relactate, and dispenses milk only on a clinician’s recommendation.
This approach curbs dependency and prevents privilege from trumping need.
Networks and partnerships
ATTA Breastmilk Community’s work has drawn interest from government bodies, private hospitals, and public health institutions.
How Stanbic Bank CFO Ronald Makata Blends Governance, Technology and Human Leadership to Drive PerformanceThe team collaborates with parent networks to promote breastfeeding and explain donor milk.
Children’s homes, among them Baby Watoto, reach out with details of babies in their care; ATTA triages based on clinical need.
Tracy has leveraged her Mastercard Foundation Scholars Programme experience and studies in Entrepreneurship & Innovation to professionalise ATTA Breastmilk Community, blending compassion with evidence, planning, and sustainability.
Policies are guided by ethics advisors, including a core principle: no payment for milk. Once money enters, the risk of adulteration rises; donations must remain donations.
Impact, stories, and milestones
What moves Tracy most is how readily people rally. Many parents fear the helplessness of having an ill child without the means to ease their suffering. Altruism finds its channel in milk donation.
Some moments are indelible: a mother who chose to donate after losing her baby, calling the act “healing”; a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit nurse reporting a preterm infant finally gaining weight; a donor mother’s message saying, “Thank you for letting me help.”
These stories keep the community going. The move into a dedicated home marks a turning point: more freezer capacity, an additional pasteurizer, and training space mean safer processing and wider reach.
ATTA Breastmilk Community also supplies storage bags so working mothers can continue breastfeeding after maternity leave, supporting families beyond crisis moments.
The cost of doing good
The work is demanding – financially, emotionally, and physically.
But Tracy still manages fundraising, operations, screening, and logistics under constant demand.
Triage decisions are hard; safety is non-negotiable. She worries about disease transmission, system strain, and the risk that the model could buckle.
“We faced so many challenges in a space few understood,” she says.
“My remedy has been telling our story to anyone who will listen, soaking up their wisdom, and studying so I can lead with heart and rigour.”
She seeks mentorship, learns from global models, and measures progress by small wins: a baby stabilised, a hospital partnership signed, a donor who returns.
Leadership, faith, and personal truths
Running ATTA Breastmilk Community has taught her that compassion needs structure and mission demands discipline.
Vulnerability, she learnt, can be a strength: naming the pain behind the purpose helps others connect and stand with the work.
Faith anchors her, while scripture steadies her in anxious moments. Community sustains her – staff, donors, friends, and volunteer ambassadors who “show up with no remuneration,” driven by their own experiences and by ATTA’s vision, keep her going.
“Our team is here because they believe in the work,” Tracy says. “Many came with personal stories that shaped their vocation. They heard mine, and it resonated.”
What the future holds
Tracy sees ATTA Breastmilk Community not as a small charity but as a movement to reshape maternal and neonatal health in Uganda, and beyond.
She envisions a one-stop centre for breastfeeding: donor milk, storage solutions, lactation training, and research under one roof.
She aims to scale Uganda’s first large-scale, community-led milk bank, partner with government to formalise milk banking in policy, and conduct longitudinal studies on donor milk safety and cultural attitudes tailored to African contexts.
If resources were not constrained, her priorities would be launching those studies and expanding infrastructure into rural areas, creating more collection and distribution points so distance never denies a baby life-saving milk.
Progress is often slow and heartbreak frequent, she admits, but every drop counts.
Her journey has taught her to pace herself, to pause and reflect, and to keep walking even when the path is unclear.
