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Archive -Seychelles

Youths give their perspective on health issues |02 September 2014

“What are the strength to adopting and maintaining a healthy lifestyle in a social environment where you operate? What are the opportunities? What are the barriers? Where and how can state and non-state actors come in to facilitate you as young people to contribute more significantly towards your own health and by extrapolation, the health of our nation?”

These were the questions the principal secretary for health, Peggy Vidot, asked a group of young people gathered at the International Conference Centre yesterday for a health conference entitled ‘Health of our Nation: Youth Perspective’.

Mrs Vidot told the youths she hopes that during their deliberations, they will come up with answers and provide those in leadership positions with the important youth perspective of these very important and significant issues.

Guests at the event included Vice-President Danny Faure; Health Minister Mitcy Larue; Public Health Commissioner Dr Jude Gedeon; chief executive of the Seychelles National Youth Council (SNYC), Vicky Van Der Westhuizen; her deputy Alvin Laurence and other high health and youth officials.

Organised jointly by the Ministry of Health, the Department of Youth and the SNYC, the conference brought  together around 150 youths, aged between 15 and 35 years, from different walks of life. It formed part of this year’s 15th annual Youth Festival which was officially opened last Friday.

The conference was to serve as a platform on which the youth will contribute towards the campaign ‘Health of our Nation: My health my responsibility’, which is a movement and a culture that places the highest value on good health for all. It was conceived as part of the modernisation process of our health system.

 Emphasis was given to the importance of involving young people in identifying problems and developing solutions to ensure that programmes, policies and health services address their needs.

The conference is a follow-up to the ‘Health of Our Nation Conference’ held in April this year. Organisers of the April conference felt that the voices of young people were not adequately represented.

“I can safely say that our young people of Seychelles are as educated generally about their health in particular as a most educated young people in the world. We know this from the many and wide ranging studies that have taken place in Seychelles and in the world. Access to education, to the media, to information technology, to health and socio-economic services have all and together put most of our young people only one step away from everything they need to know about their health and help to improve their health,” said Mrs Vidot.

She also stated that socio-researches have also proven time and time again that young people’s knowledge about their health and the risks to their health does not necessarily translate into young people making healthy lifestyle choices.

Noting that youths are not making optimum use of available health service, Mrs Vidot said health is not just only health services but can be sustained, improved and threatened at home where they live; at schools and work places where young people study and at places where young people socialise.

Mrs Vidot told the youths that the leaders need to hear from them on how to better tailor health services to suit their needs and it is for this reason that the conference is so important.

She said that the youths’ intellect, agility, dynamism make them the motor of Seychelles of today and tomorrow.

“Your health is your capital. Not only for your own personal development and happiness but also for the development and welfare of our nation. We are indeed very proud of you; we trust in you and we would like to hear from you,” said PS Vidot.

Nineteen-year-old Shireen Denys, an A-Level graduate who is going to study law at the University of Seychelles this month, made a presentation on ‘My Health, My Responsibility’ where she also urged the youths to take responsibility for their health by adopting healthy lifestyles.

In another presentation Dr Sanjeev Pugazhendhi spoke on doctor-patient relations where honesty, trust and rapport should be the key elements and that the most important element in medicine is for the doctor to never do harm while stating a patient never cares how much a doctor knows but on how much he cares.
 
Jana Isaac, a student from the Mont Fleuri secondary school and a member of the Youth Assembly and District Youth Committee also talked on healthy living, making reference to school tuck shops that need to beef up on healthy food.

In his presentation, Loni Adeline, a project manager at the Public Utilities Corporation, spoke on the common health issues affecting people in Seychelles like obesity, diabetes, stroke, smoking, heart disease, alcohol, sexually transmitted diseases and hepatitis C.
 
He even suggested some everyday simple steps that we can do which would go a long way to remedy these issues.

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