Introduction
Information, Education and Communication
Services
Advocacy and Policy Development
HIV/AIDS
Results
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Services
Services One of the many lessons learned from UNFPA's involvement in
promoting better reproductive health for young people is that information
and education can be largely wasted if sexually active adolescents and
youth do not have access to appropriate services. Many governments are
increasingly aware of the necessity of providing such services if their
other efforts at promoting adolescent reproductive health are to be
effective.
In Bolivia, for example, the Ministry of Health is committed to
providing special services for adolescents, but so far it has not
developed a national model that takes into account the large indigenous
and rural populations and the many young people who are not in school. To
help the Government address this challenge, UNFPA began a cost-sharing
project in 1999 with a bilateral development agency to provide
reproductive health information and services to adolescents in three urban
districts. Experience from this project, implemented jointly with the
Ministry of Health and Ministry of Education, will help establish a
standard that can be adopted by Bolivia's public health system.
In
Eritrea, UNFPA helped establish youth centres in the port cities of
Massawa and Assab to provide counselling and reproductive health services
as well as library and recreational activities, youth rallies and radio
programmes. Training on peer counselling and adolescent reproductive
health was provided to 26 participants in Assab and 44 participants in
Massawa.
In the Dominican Republic, where pregnancy and birth
complications are a leading cause of death among teenage girls, UNFPA has
supported a programme that has provided training for a network of 360 peer
educators who, in addition to carrying out information activities,
distribute condoms and provide referrals to health services. Within the
health-care system, doctors, nurses and other health-care professionals
have been provided with training to sensitize them to the needs of the
young people. Likewise, in Malawi the Fund provided assistance for a
project for out-of-school adolescents that includes a community- based
distribution programme of contraceptives. Young people, selected by the
community, are trained to distribute the contraceptives and to make
referrals to reproductive health clinics. In the clinics, the Fund has
supported training of the health-care workers to provide youth-friendly
services.
In Algeria, UNFPA has provided support for a youth information
project that reaches all of the country's 48 administrative areas through
a health care centre in each area. In
order to make the crucial link between information and services, the staff
of these centres – a total of 500 service providers, including doctors,
psychologists, surgeons and dentists – have received training on dealing
with young people and providing them with the information and care they
need to protect their reproductive health. In Djibouti, UNFPA is working
with WHO and UNDP on an adolescent girls' project that includes
information and access to quality community-based reproductive health
services through midwives, traditional birth attendants, and well-equipped
primary health care centres. This is the first project in Djibouti
specifically aimed at addressing the needs of adolescent girls, and it
brings together four Ministries for coordinated action.
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Turner's UN Foundation
supports UNFPA
youth projects
In November 1999, the United Nations Population Fund
received grants worth more than $4 million from Ted Turner's United
Nations Foundation for projects to improve adolescent reproductive health
in three regions.
* Adolescent Reproductive Health in the Pacific Region,
with $2.3 million over three years. The project will work with both in-
and out-of-school youth to provide them with reproductive health
information and services, as well as training in livelihood skills. It
will work with teachers, parents and religious communities to increase
knowledge and promote their involvement in adolescent reproductive health
in eight of the region's 22 island-countries and territories.
* Health and
Well-being of Jordanian Adolescent Girls, with $1.1 million over three
years. Complementing UNFPA's current country programme, the project will
help develop a comprehensive youth strategy for Jordan. Through training,
education and outreach, it will encourage the participation of 42,000
girls, aged 13-17, in reproductive health activities and life skills
development, and will upgrade the skills of hundreds of educators and
school counsellors. Advocacy efforts will focus on decision-makers in the
Ministry of Education and other ministries, NGOs and school administrators
in 26 educational districts.
* Reproductive Health of Adolescents in the
Russian Federation, with $707,726 over two years. The project, to be
carried out with the Russian Family Planning Association, will focus on
100,000-200,000 young people in six regions – Moscow, St. Petersburg,
Novossibirsk, Tver, Barnaul and Tomsk. It will support orphans under State
care, provide shelters for pregnant adolescent girls, provide reproductive
health information to adolescents in summer camps and vocational schools,
train medical staff and social workers regarding
"youth-friendly" services, and promote advocacy for adolescents.
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