UN Trains relief experts in Uganda

Uganda has hosted a United Nations training program for relief workers in a quest to step up preparedness for global humanitarian response.

According to the program co coordinator, resulted from a realization by the United Nations Population fund (UNFPA) that since the Cairo population conference 2 decades ago there has been a lack of specified capacity among humanitarian workers to attend to RH issues each time an emergency breaks out resulting into, ambulance increased levels of unwanted pregnancies, HIV transmission, and complications due to pregnancy and delivery among others.

“It has been even worse in cases when and where various humanitarian agencies work in an uncoordinated manner attempting to respond to the same crisis resulting into duplication of services and waste of scarce resources” Ingvill noted.

 UNFPA has for that reason recruited humanitarian workers from all Humanitarian agencies to attend the Kampala inter agency training workshop held last week at the Munyonyo Resort Beach with a view to master, the Minimum Initial Service Package (MISP) for reproductive Health designed as a set of priority activities to be taken in a coordinated manner by trained staff during the onset of an emergency situation anywhere on the globe within 72 hours.

According to Doedens Wilma, UNFPA’s technical adviser on Humanitarian response and one of the facilitators, if implemented in the early days of an emergency, the MISP can save lives and prevent illness, especially among women and girls. This is done through actions and guidelines set in place by the MISP that work to prevent sexual violence and provide care for survivors, reduce the transmission of HIV, prevent excess maternal and newborn mortality and morbidity, and plan for the provision of comprehensive reproductive health services that are integrated with primary health care, as the situation permits.

Sandra Krause, the Director of Women’s Commission for Refugee Women and Children says the training will breed more efficiency in humanitarian responses to crises

She explains that desperate circumstances in which displaced women and girls flee conflict put them at exceptional risk of pregnancy-related death, illness and disability.

“The MISP works to prevent excess neonatal and maternal morbidity and mortality by establishing a referral system that is functional 24 hours a day, seven days per week to manage obstetric and newborn emergencies.

It calls for provision of midwife delivery kits (with newborn resuscitation supplies) to facilitate clean and safe deliveries at the health facility, provision of clean delivery kits (with simple instructions) to visibly pregnant women and birth attendants, and identification of skilled birth attendants who are capable of providing essential newborn care and resuscitation.” Krause says.

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