by Loveth Asogwa Obiora,
Survive Fistula Health Care Foundation (SFHF) on Wednesday 19th and Thursday 20th of May, 2021 in Abuja organized a 2- day training workshop for women with disabilities in FCT on Sexual and Reproductive Health Right (SRHR).
The project is funded by CBM and it is geared towards providing support for women and girls with disabilities to access affordable, quality and sustainable sexual and reproductive Health (SRH) services.
The Executive Director Mrs Peters Ogunmayin in her speech said that the training is for the participants to have the knowledge of SRHR and also quality care in accessing their health rights. She stated that many women with disabilities have died because of their inability to access health care services which is the right of every human being including women with disabilities and that is why this training is very important in other to direct them on the right approach, and how to access health care services.
Speaking further, she stated that the training is going to establish a network among participants who were drawn from three Area councils, Kuje, Kwali and Gwagwalada, and also the participants should be able to educate their community and other women with disabilities in their Area Councils.
She also stated that the aim of this project is also to assist women with disabilities on how to advocate and also hold the society accountable for their rights in line with laws and policies that have been established. They should also know when their rights are been violated and how to demand for their rights.
Victoria David in the course of the training outlined the objectives of the workshop, first to educate women and girls with disabilities about the Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) rights and needs in line with the National policy on SRH for persons with disabilities (PWDs) with emphasis on women and girls.
The participants were taken on when and how to access SRH and there was sensitization of the group on the need and plan advocacy visit to promote rights and access of PWDs to sexual and reproductive health.
The participants were taken on an overview on of disability, SRHR and its components, barriers to SRH for PWDs and dangers of lack of access to SRH and overview of key SRH services (safe motherhood, emergency obstetric care, family planning, fistula care).
Participants shared their experiences on accessing SRH services and they were also taken on overview of gender &disability based violence, harmful traditional practices, and sexual health education as well as an overview of the National Disability Act, National Policy on Sexual and Reproductive Health for PWDs with emphasis on women and girls and other related Policies and Acts that protects the rights of PWDs.
The participants also got knowledge on reasonable accommodation for PWDs in health facilities, practical solution to improve availability, accessibility, and affordability of SRH for PWDs, implementation status of the National Policy on SRHR and finally developing plans for advocacy visit to promote SRH for PWDs.
There was discussion on what PWDs needs to do to be able to receive SRH in the community, and opinion sharing on requirement of hospital in providing SRH and how PWDs would be able to use them.
Some pictures of the event:
