A Non- Governmental Organisation, known as the GEM Hub Initiative has called on government at all levels, development partners and well meaning individuals to ameliorate the predicament of Hepatitis Patients in the country.
Executive Director of the Organisation, Oyeyemi Pitan gave the call on Thursday, July 25, 2024 during a Hepatitis awareness walk in Kabusa, Abuja.
Pitan explained that the walk was part of activities lined up to mark this year’s World Hepatitis Day. Other activities include free hepatitis testing, health education, counseling among others.
World Hepatitis Day, commemorated every 28th of July is a day set aside to
increase advocacy, education and engagement with governments, health professionals and the public to drive awareness and action to eliminate viral hepatitis.
According to Pitan, “this outreach is to create awareness about Hepatitis B and C but more importantly, we are implementing a particular project in kabusa community and it is targeted towards pregnant teenagers as well as mothers.
“We had an interactive session where we asked the women if they knew what hepatitis was and we were able to clear misinformations and talked to them about the fact that even if you test positive, you can go to the hospital for treatment. We also know that the treatment is not free unlike HIV/AIDS intervention we have in the country”.
She explained that they were spurred by the fact that there were no Hepatitis treatment interventions in the country. This in turn has led to the high prevalence rate as more people were being exposed to the disease daily.
“There’s no intervention, the prevalence is high in the country. We are using this opportunity to call on development partners and the government to put in more funding into the treatment of hepatitis B and C because a whole lot of people; 20 million people are battling with the disease in Nigeria”, she said.
The Executive Director disclosed that after the test, those who were negative would be referred to the General Hospital for vaccination at a price while ensuring their children take their routine immunisation at the primary health center at no cost. Those who test positive would however, be referred to Asokoro General Hospital to commence treatment.
She further informed that they had been having conversations with young people in the community about their Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights.
“We’ve been talking to them about maternal and newborn child care because we understand what it is for a woman to give birth not to talk of a child giving birth.
“We’ve targeted young people in this community and we’re telling them that now that you are pregnant, what next? Giving them the right information on what to do and we cease the opportunity to do the hepatitis awareness since it’s hepatitis day on Monday. We also used this session to talk to them about different Sexually Transmitted Infections and Diseases”, Pitan said.
A beneficiary of the teen moms hope program organised GEM Hub Initiative, Blessing Onyege narrated how lessons learnt from the program helped her through pregnancy and successful delivery. She warned fellow teenagers to avoid peer pressure and be wary of unprotected sex.
The Outreach was done in collaboration with the Vaccine Network For Disease Control, Stand With A Girl Initiative and Elohim Foundation.
