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On a Journey Toward Health Awareness

Our nation is home to a million adolescent girls and women who are devoid of basic facilities to maintain menstrual hygiene. There are myths about it that are passed down from generation to generation. And due to obstructions in managing menses in a healthy way, females fall at a risk of contracting diseases that can, eventually, affect their state of mind. They lack awareness because nobody talks about it. To change this scenario, Good Universe, a society of social workers, healthcare specialists and young like-minded people, is working towards it. They believe that investing in health is vital to building viable communities. Kamal Nayak, the founder of this NGO, was studying Bachelors in Social Work at Osmania University, back in 2013, where they were asked to go to slum areas for a project. He realized that many women were struggling to manage this monthly occurrence. Multiple health conditions were affecting their menstrual cycle but awareness about this was low.

Breaking the silence

Soon, this cause became more than a project for him and the organisation was formed. “The vision is to break the silence and, at the same time, spread awareness among all the genders. Why are we forced to speak about the whole situation in whispers,” questions Kamal, who started the journey in 2014 and, since then, has been working closely with local communities in and around Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. His team consists of 12 individuals that target both the care seekers and care providers. “Our focus areas are reproductive health, mental health, breast and cervical cancer, among others. We do health camps with rural women and provide them IEC (information, education and communication) materials in their regional languages. We want them to come out of their inhibitions and discuss it. It is not just women from rural areas but even the ones from urban areas lack awareness. If they lack information, those issues will remain unaddressed and the negative effects will add up, preventing them from leading a healthy life,” the 26-year-old asserts by saying.

Making men aware

“It is also important to make men aware of what a woman goes through. So, we conduct seminars at colleges and take a session for male students. A lot of authorities deny and a few support us. So far, we have reached 11,390 females and 1200 males,” says Kamal who has been selected as one of the 40 UN Local Pathway Fellow at UN SDSN across the globe. Sharing about his upcoming campaign, he says, “Menstrual cups are, again, a taboo. One needs to understand they are a safer option. They are a reusable sanitary product which makes menstruation affordable for women even belonging to the rural areas,” says Kamal who started this campaign on December 1 which will continue for three months where they aim to distribute 1000 free cups among women. “We will train and educate them on how to use the cups and how they are beneficial to them and the environment. After the campaign, we will do a follow-up and generate a report which will be submitted to various government, private and non-profit organisations. The ultimate aim is to make an impact and we hope we achieve that,” he adds. – Telangana Today

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