Bukola Afeni
Stakeholders in the health sector have declared their commitment towards supporting and prioritising, adolescent, and young people’s well-being in Nigeria.
The Program Officer, of Education as a Vaccine, Mr Phillip Idoko, said stakeholders are fully ready to tackle adolescent challenges in the country.
He stated this at the Global Forum for Adolescents 2023 program in Abuja.
According to him, the 1.8 billion campaign was launched in the country to be able to implement a digital collection platform through WhatsApp platform and paper called “The What Young People Want Initiative”.
” The new initiative seeks to capture the real-life perspective concerns, and fear of young people.
It deployed WhatsApp, a digital collection platform on WhatsApp, and even through paper collections, by simply asking what young people want to improve on their health and wellbeing.”
According to Philip, the campaign “WHAT YOUNG PEOPLE WANT” generated over 56,000 responses from young people across all geopolitical zones in Nigeria.
He said over 56,000 young people’s responses across all the geopolitical zones in Nigeria were generated during the campaign.
“The average age of the respondents is 16 years old, consisting of 55.75% male, and 42.99% female.
The respondent is asking for, safety and support, Good health and nutrition, Agency and Resilience, Community and connectedness, Education and employment”, he said.
The program officer disclosed that the highest responses highlighted young people’s demanding skills.
” They desired employability skills that would fetch them money to obtain financial independence from their parents.
The next response was Access to good health, and nutrition and other pressing health care needs”.
The Honourable Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof Ali Pate, also reinstated its commitment to prioritizing and providing the necessary financial support to address the challenges facing young people and ensure their well-being.
The Global Forum for Adolescents is the largest-ever gathering for adolescent wellbeing.
The forum is meant to unite young people.
