HUM spreads awareness regarding prevention of common water, food and pathogen borne diseases in rural areas and is advocating for integration of preventive health in the national health campaigns of India. Primary features are:health literacy camps and educating youth regarding prevention of critical diseases through activity-based learning, the creation of local R&D units and formation of self-help groups with community leaders to device local solutions and safety methods in the field of preventive health, implementation and monitoring of village-wide preventive health initiatives by leaders within the local community, organization of a database to contain most effective preventive measures, and advocacy for public health rights, functional primary health care centers in villages and access to critical medical care, via the Right to Information Act.
HUM increases awareness for prevention of common water, food and pathogen borne diseases in rural areas. Primary features are: the creation of local R&D units and formation of self-help groups with community leaders to device local solutions and safety methods in the field of preventive health, implementation and monitoring of village-wide initiatives by leaders from within the local community, organization of a database to contain most effective preventive measures, and advocacy via the Right to Information, for public health rights including functional primary health care centers in villages and access to critical medical care.
India speds only 0.9% of its GDP on public health, resulting in millions of people in rural areas without access to even basic primary health care. While providing curative health services on such a large scale (for almost a billion people) is only possible through the State, there is another intervention point where nonprofits can have maximum impact--preventive health. HUM provides information regarding preventive measures and safety strategies to protect against widespread common diseases such as malaria, typhoid, and cholera. Many of these diseases are preventible through lifestyle, sanitation and indegenous solutions and can help reduce the disease burden in areas where access to curative healthcare is next to zero. There are few NGOs delivering low-cost preventive health programs in rural areas in India, such as Navam and Ruchi, however HUM creates direct stakeholders in the community and generates ideas with the involvement of local governing bodies, thus giving people ownership of the program so that they have a deeper connection with it and hence a bigger stake in its success. We also empower people to demand their RIght to Public Health Care through legal advocacy support via the Right to Information Act. Our approach of direct empowerment and involvement of local community members is unique in the region.
Our awareness campaign spreads information about health behaviour and preventative measures through seminars, literature, and interactive games and activities with youth in schools and the wider community including women and marginalized social groups through village council meetings. We also provide legal support in filing Right to Information (RTI) applications to ensure delivery of public health care program services.
Comments
Hi Adhar,
I like the model of advocacy and interaction that you have developed to improve health knowledge. I do, however, wonder if you might benefit from taking an even more interactive approach with marginalized members of the communities in which you are working. You've mentioned that you provide training through seminars and interactive games--but these activities still seem to have you being the instigator. How can you incorporate the people in a way that makes them the key change agents, so that they can be acting and educating themselves and others even when you aren't in the community? How can you get these people to be interacting with their local government to make long-term and lasting changes? From my experience, the way that my organization was able to achieve this is by working with marginalized groups to create a training program that they conduct. We trained women's groups in reproductive health, then worked with them to develop educational dramas and songs. They perform these in their communities at events they organize, which allows the education to continue working all year long, regardless of whether we are instigating a particular event. This had the effect of engendering a great level of public participation in health advocacy--when a local health center wasn't providing quality care, instead of asking us to step in and "fix it", the community members lobbied their local government officials to require their intercession.
I'm not sure the best way for you to engage your beneficiaries, but I'm sure that there are many ways you might try, and I would start with a very honest discussion with the community leadership where you're working. Ask questions like: what are the most important challenges facing your community in terms of health and development? What type of education do you think is needed? How do you think the community will learn the best? How do you think you could engage the community at large? How can we, as an organization, support you in those endeavors?
Just some food for thought...
Jacquie
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