By Eliza Squibb | Executive Director
We are happy to say that the incidence of Ebola has greatly decreased in the past 6 months. However, that doesn’t mean that its time to stop educating people about the risks and means of transmission.
In our last report, our "storytelling cloth" for Ebola education was headed to Sierra Leone with the NGO Khadarlis. Aisha, Khadarlis' director shared the cloth far and wide to get everyone's opinions on it.
She took it to different ministries in the capital, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Energy, among others, and it was well received everywhere. Everyone was excited about using cloth to spread health information. Aisha looked into the possibilities for production and funding. Unfortunately, despite the high interest, the public health structures in Sierra Leone said they did not have sufficient funding to back the project themselves, although they readily agreed to become partners in the process if the funding were to come from elsewhere.
Using textiles to spread health education is a new idea. From our study in Mali on HPV awareness, 95% of 94 women surveyed thought that using cloth was an effective way to educate women about their reproductive health.
At GAIA, we are exciting to expand this work to neighboring countries where health education is sorely needed. If you join us in supporting this textile innovation in Sierra Leone, we hope to have an effect on dangerous disease outbreaks of the future.
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By Eliza Squibb | E
By Eliza Squibb | Executive Director
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