An orientation workshop on Gender and Human Rights on Tuberculosis for media practitioners from Anambra and Ebonyi states has ended in Enugu with a call on the press to champion public education on tuberculosis (TB) control.
Organised by Grassroots Development and Empowerment Foundation (GRADE Foundation) in collaboration with Centre for Development and Reproductive Health (CDRH), under the auspices of the Stop TB Partnership Challenge Facility for Civil Society.
Participants were journalists, on-air personalities, bloggers, and content creators from various media outfits in Anambra and Ebonyi States.
Welcoming participants, Executive Director, GRADE Foundation, Patrick Amah, said the project was aimed at involving more women and girls who easily fall victims of gender and human rights related issues in TB control with the help of the print, electronic and social media in educating and enlightening the public.
He revealed that TB is the third leading cause of death among women of reproductive age while research has it that women are greatly affected by stigma and discrimination within the family, healthcare facilities and the communities.
Providing an in-depth training based on the manual for TB Programmes, Executive Director of CDRH, Isaac Alobu, outlined factors that make women vulnerable to TB, including poverty, poor nutrition, low socio-economic status, living with HIV, delayed care-seeking, and fear of being disengaged from their employment if they have TB among others.
He urged participants to communicate to the public the contagious nature of TB which is also curable, emphasizing the role of overcrowding, poor ventilation, and inadequate coughing hygiene in its spread.
He urged them to communicate to the public that although TB is a contagious disease that could be contracted through coughing, sneezing, singing and laughing, it is also curable but its spread could be increased through overcrowding, poor ventilation and poor coughing hygiene.
The epidemiologist who spoke on “Empowering women drives change,” explained the essence of the programme while calling for the enactment of law prohibiting deliberate spreading of contagious diseases in Nigeria.
“This is to provide the journalists with the knowledge about the key components of TB programmes involving rights to care service, treatment and right to dignity of human persons. “In Nigeria, everyone is at the risk of contracting TB germs provided the person lives because over 70% of adults have the germ,” he stated.
According to him, the chances of contracting either latent or active TB and other respiratory diseases could be reduced by maintaining good ventilation, consumption of balanced diets, observing public health rules and cough etiquettes, avoiding unpasteurized foods among others. He defined TB as serious chronic contagious disease that affects the lungs mainly and other parts of the body adding that the ailment for the lungs is called pulmonary TB while the one for other parts is known as extrapulmonary.
Alobu also mentioned fear of stigmatization and discrimination as known hindrances to care seeking for TB among women, noting that they are infected more than their male counterparts. He also said: “TB infection in women is less likely to progress to TB disease while men are more likely to develop the same health problem, the ratio is 2:1, compared to men, less percentage of women who develop the sickness get diagnosed“This is generally because of the intense stigma and discrimination faced by women who have TB, the women who develop the disease are more likely to die as a result of the same problem than men.”
Alobu further recommended adequate protection of female interests, improved equitable access to TB care and empowerment of women and girls to actively participate in TB prevention and control.
He said that there should be a routine integration of TB screening, Isoniazid Preventive Therapy (IPT) into entry points for health system for women as Antenatal Care Clinics (ACN) and others. “Gender-related barriers to diagnosis, treatment and follow up of persons with TB should be incorporated into routine monitoring and evaluation activities with gender and age segregation of data,” he said
Alobu, then, appealed for continuous training of healthcare providers, HIV counsellors and the community health workers to always provide the women with TB prevention, screening, diagnosis and treatment literacy irrespective of the service delivery point.
The CDRH Director also advised that women and girls’ organizations should be trained and mobilized to enable them advocate for TB and TB/HIV services for women, participate in community-based TB prevention, screening, identifying and linking presumptive TB cases to health facilities.
“There is need to sensitize the CSOs to organize and establish networks to carry out TB education and Community TB care while the survivors of the health problem will be supported to act as champions for elimination of stigma and discrimination,” he stated
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