The Realities Of Life

The Pads For Girls Everywhere campaign is an initiative coined by the Hope For Future Generations, a non-governmental civil society organization in Ghana that seeks to improve the quality of life of women and children. According to UNICEF, around 26% of the female population globally are of reproductive age. This is one of the reasons why Hope For Future Generations is mobilizing 3 million pads for over 500,000 girls everywhere.

This campaign has been set up to commemorate their 20th anniversary in 2021. Hope For Future Generations chose this precise initiative due to the challenges girls face in the area of menstrual hygiene. Many young girls who go to school are unable to practice menstrual hygiene since they have limited accessibility to menstrual hygienic resources and products. According to World Bank, promoting menstrual hygiene management is not only a sanitation matter; it is also an important step towards protecting the dignity, bodily integrity and overall life opportunities of women and girls.

The Young Health Advocates Ghana (YHAG) , a youth-led empowering and capacity building group has joined this campaign by donating an amount to support the initiative. It is of utmost importance for all hands to be on deck to support young girls especially in these critical times. The YHAG group urges everyone to participate in this donation and ultimately change the lives of girls everywhere.

It is with no doubt that malaria has resided in the midst of humankind for hundreds if not thousands of years. In 2018, 228 million malaria cases were recorded with an estimate of 405,000 deaths worldwide. This has rendered numerous families poorer and emotionally traumatized the lives of thousands across the globe. The intrusion of the new coronavirus has brought the world to a stop, however, it has not halted many diseases such as malaria.

As young malaria champions such as the Youth Leaders For Health, advocate for increased domestic funding for malaria, it is of utmost importance to consider the change that communities can make in its elimination once and for all. The eradication of malaria has been attained by many countries, and Ghana must take on the task to curb it indefinitely.

Ghana, between January and March, 2020, has recorded a total of 1,001,070 malaria cases in the country according to the Ghana Health Service (GHS).

Out of the 1,001,070 malaria cases, 21,201 were children under five years and 28,764 pregnant women. In the first quarter of 2020, 54 malaria deaths have been recorded. Globally, 3.3 billion people in 106 countries are at risk of malaria.

It is critical to regard that as we continue to advocate for international and governmental investments in malaria eradication, we ought not to forget the inclusion of communities in this journey of eradication. Communities have the capacity to halve the malaria burden tremendously. Unfortunately, many communities underestimate the severity of malaria and how it can create irreversible damages in the social and psychological aspects of our lives.

The ability of communities to utilize the effective preventive methods of malaria is an immense power on its own. Communities’ improvement in environmental sanitation and families sleeping under mosquito nets are the primary preventive techniques to be undertaken by individuals. Mothers of children under five are obligated to seek medical attention for their sick wards immediately. The essence of visiting the hospital the moment any malaria symptoms are noticed must be communicated more frequently. The attitude of self malaria medication by individuals is what exacerbates the severity of the disease.

If investments are made in malaria and communities continue to ignore the preventive measures and misuse the protective tools in reducing the malaria burden, then governmental and societal efforts will be wasted.

Therefore it is with crucial necessity to bring communities’ attention to the power they wield in halving the malaria burden and ultimately eradicating it.

Zero Malaria starts with you and I.

Ever since the Human Deficiency Virus reared its head in the domain of humans, a lot of interventions have been put into action to curb its damage. Mankind has been successful in providing medication for positives and going as far as providing a sort of vaccine, known as the Pre Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) for people who are at a high risk of getting infected.

Despite these intense measures, society is forgetting infected adolescents and young people. Many of them were born with the virus, some contracted it through sexual abuse, others simply out of sheer ignorance. The stigma and discrimination associated with HIV is so agonizingly high to the extent that parents are not ready to disclose to their adolescents who are above 15 years.

Other parents have raised their positive children in complete isolation. Such teenagers have no friends and are forbidden from making any not to even speak about engaging in school clubs and friendly hangouts. Even at the facility where adolescents go for their check-ups and medications, they do not interact with each other. They sit there in complete silence as if they are disgusted with themselves.

The most burning matter is they all have questions they want answers to but have no one they can ask or confide in. Each one of them is going through some sort of psychological trauma of which they need to share with a confidential someone. Yet, they can not even trust their parents for fear of being labeled bad kids. They can’t even confide in their doctors for fear of being judged.

They all have daunting questions such as will they ever get married? Will they ever achieve their dreams? Will they ever secure a job? Will they drop dead one day? Will their life partner accept them for who they are? These and many more are questions they know not whom to ask.

I can tell you for a fact, that young people living with HIV have as much potential as the negatives. HIV does not make them less normal. They can achieve much more than they can anticipate. There is a need to educate not only them but their parents as well.

The world has neglected them for far too long and this is causing them to lose their lives. They have no idea the tremendous success they can achieve and it’s heartbreaking. It’s about time they are given their own sanctuary to flourish through attaining information and motivation on how to live a good life. They must be made to acknowledge their own potential and most importantly they must be given the opportunity to achieve their purposes.

If they can feel comfortable asking their questions and not be judged by society and they are given the necessary information on the right choices to make, they would not feel insignificant or unworthy.

Yeah life sometimes sucks, doesn’t mean you suck. Get up and make you happy.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton