UCHENA ANOZIE, NIGERIA
Safe health initiative programme was born out ingenuity of
Uchenna Anozie and Johnpaul Onwuaso both Nigerians and with the utmost
mentorship and support from Dr, Sugata from In India.
Both initiators have been in the field of battling HIV/AIDS
for more than 7 years in Nigeria, They
have worked for many local , national and international organizations. It is
with their gathered experiences that they decided to launch a pet programme in a
pilot scale to fight against AIDS.
They decided to have a peer education program for sex
workers in 2 states outs of 36 states in Nigeria namely Ebonyi and Anambra
State. In the course of running this programme they found out that people
living with HIV/ AIDS in Ebonyi state lacked attention from the Government and
even concern of the health facilities, it is due to this factor that safe
health initiate programme extended her hands to work with people living with
HIV/AIDS using a private health facility (Fellysussy Memorial Hospital) as an ambulatory hospital for PLWHA in the
state.
Today Safe health initiative Programme has 15 sex workers
that receive support from the programme and over 16 PLWHA’s receiving support
from the initiative, these supports ranges from health promotion, psychosocial
support, linking patients to main hospitals that administer (HAART: Highly
active antiretroviral treatment)at Federal Teaching Hospital Abakaliki,
education on nutrition, free distribution of mosquito nets, HIV screening,
ambulatory treatment for PLWHA, blood donation for anemic patients, and even
vocational support through other NGOs.
The programme is facing lots of challenges, especially in
the area of ensuring that patients receive appropriate attention from Hospitals
that Administer HAART but recently through the help of a Nurse in Federal
Medical Teaching Hospital Abakaliki called Sister Ann and a Doctor known as Dr.
Eze, things are much easier now.
Another challenge is that most people living with HIV/AIDS
in our area are women, more especially pregnant women, they are mostly low
income earners therefore lots of financial support is needed to help them
transport to health facilities, have micro-gardens at homes, vocational
trainings and even money to supply them with relief materials such as sanitary
materials, mosquito nets and food supplements.
So far we observed that 80% of the women enrolled in the
programme are HIV discordant with their
husbands thereby creating huge social
problems for them but it’s part of the programme to educate their spouses on
how to cope with HIV discordant relationship.
The initiative hopes to expand her services and even enroll
much number of sex workers and PLWHA in future and we solicit for fund, health
support materials, food supplements and vitamins, malaria drugs, cloths, food
for babies living with HIV/AIDS etc.
The initiative appreciates in a special way Dr. Sugata who
has been a mentor and a technical adviser to the initiators of this pet
programme we also thank Nurse Ann for her special way of facilitating protocols
that are observed in the HAART center in Abakaliki for our patients.
The programme also remembers all her enrolled members both
sex workers and people living with HIV/AIDS and encourages them to keep
practicing safe and positive health practices.
If you are moved by our programme (Safe health Initiative
Programme) please do not hesitate to comment or even write us at: donuchman@yahoo.com or sms+2348033746531
or post mails to No 12 Onitsha street, Abakaliki, Ebonyi State Nigeria. If you
want to give any support by donating materials or giving financial support to
the programme, please do write us with the above email address so that we can
facilitate your donation.
Remember your ideas are very important and we count on them.Thanks
for reading.
