The Adolescence Health Awareness Campaign

Although several interventions have been undertaken to address the issues faced by adolescents and young people when it comes to their overall well-being, there has been some stagnation on some issues such as teenage pregnancy and child marriage.

The MOH, Ministry of Education, and Sports embarked on having all the players speak the same language when it comes to adolescents and young people’s health issues. An ADH awareness campaign dubbed ‘healthy habits, healthy life’’ was launched and UYAHF cascaded it to 10 of their districts of implementation.

The campaign is an initiative aimed at providing age-appropriate health information and career guidance, as well as advocating for behavioral change targeting adolescents and young people in and out of school. The awareness campaign is aimed at bridging the information gap and reducing the widely spread social problem of unhealthy lifestyles and irresponsible practices influencing the lives of most adolescents and young people in and out of school.

Whereas a lot is being done to realize young people’s involvement in sustainable development through formal education, capacity building, various pieces of training for skills provision, advocacy, and empowerment in various areas; Less is or can be achieved given the lifestyles and behavioral nature of most adolescents and the young people in Uganda. In Isingiro district the campaign reached 516 participants of which 221 were Male and 295 Female.

During the ADH awareness campaign, integrated community outreaches were held in the sub-counties of Rugaga, Isingiro town council, and Nyakitunda in the villages. Services were brought closer to the people in the community who accessed several services such as HIV testing and counseling, yellow fever immunization, polio vaccination, family planning services both long term and short term, cervical and breast cancer screening, STI screening, and free condom distribution among others.