TellZim reporter
Masvingo City Council is set to revive its defunct youth friendly corners in 2023 as part of efforts to ensure youth have enough access to social interactions which would also promote engagements that help them desist from harmful practices like drug and substance abuse.
The revelation was made by council’s Health Director Suzanne Hazel Madamombe during a ‘Girls choose’ engagement meeting organized by MyAge at the Civic Centre in Masvingo on November 2, 2022 where young people working as champions shared experiences in as far as sexual reproductive health issues are concerned.
“As council, we used to have quite a number of youth friendly corners where young people would have access to various services like information on Sexual Reproductive Health (SRH), but right now they are not functional due to various reasons beyond council’s control.
“However, we are going to make sure that in 2023, we try and revive such facilities for the benefit of the youth and ensure they once again have access to such facilities. Currently Masvingo is offering some of those services at our four clinics where young people can go and get help.
“We really hope that as Masvingo City Council will work closely with partners like MyAge in 2023 to ensure we make Masvingo health system is open to all youth with no discrimination and increasingly build confidence of the youth to even have more health seeking behaviour as a way of protecting all people from issues surrounding sexual reproductive health,” Madamombe said.
She went on to applaud the youth for the role they are playing in society through information dissemination concerning their health.
“Let me take the opportunity to applaud MyAge Girls Choose champions for the roles they are playing in the community at each city health facility in particular. As council, we would like to thank you for the role you have played in Masvingo as we have seen that through your strategies and interventions, cases of Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) have been going down. The girls have been trained to work responsibly serving the community in promoting sexual and reproductive health in the community.
“This group of youth is helping disseminate information to youth and adolescence as well as young people aged between 16 and 25. The champions have assumed responsibility on distribution of materials focusing on sexual abuse, gender based violence, necessary information on HIV and AIDS and STIs. They also assist in creating awareness among the youth of the services city health department is offering at our health facilities like HIV testing, Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) initiation, viral load checking, monitoring and emergency contraceptions,” she added.
Madamombe said the champions have acted as a bridge between health service providers and the community thereby promoting health-seeking behaviour among adolescence while at the same time promoting efficient health service delivery.
The situation facing youth in as far as sexual reproductive health is concerned has further been exacerbated by the increased uptake of drugs and other toxic substances leading to risky sexual behaviours in young people.
