Public health emergencies affect the education and safety of children in several ways. Due to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, for instance, the education of 5 million children was interrupted.- School closures across Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone between 2014 and 2015 made it difficult for the governments of these countries to find alternative ways to provide continued education, resulting in many children dropping out of school. The current pandemic has forced most govern- ments around the world to temporarily close educational institutions in an attempt to contain the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, impacting over 91% of the world’s student popu- lation according to UNESCO. Uganda, amidst its economic challenges, the unforeseen situation of the COVID-19 pandemic is another turn of the screw in the education situation of its school-going age population. This research looks systematically at the opportunities and challenges of diffus- ing e-learning in the context of Uganda, where the vast majority lack basic needs for livelihood and access to the internet is a problem.