01, May-2021 Editor
By James Buyinza
Merk Foundation in collaboration with African First Ladies have called on governments in Africa and Asia to lay stringent measures in fighting female infertility stigma that undermines women’s equal representation and promote quality health facilities.
The call was made recently during a three day virtual workshop of the 8th Edition of Merk Africa- Asia Luminary 2021, in which First Ladies from 13 African countries, health experts and Education Ministers shared their specific country experiences on improving healthcare.
In his opening remarks, His Excellency the President of Zambia Dr. Edgar Lungu Chagwa called on African Leaders to strongly commit in investing more in health sector through building capacities of the health workers. This he said Covid-19 pandemic was an insight in Africa to direct enough resources towards strengthening the health sector, thus Merk Foundation as a partner in the sector has taken a leading role in ensuring that Africa health workers benefit from specialized training.
His Excellency the President of Zambia Dr. Edgar Lungu
The President expressed his country’s commitment in partnering with Merk Foundation to bring about the desired positive results in the health services within Zambia.
“I am confident that this platform will help us to exploit partnership opportunities and introduce new frameworks for cooperation in the area of capacity building of healthcare workers” the President said.
While addressing participants, the Chief Executive Officer of Merk Foundation Dr. Rasha Kelej explained that her foundation aims at impacting the lives of many women and girls in developing countries through capacity building and creating awareness of the problems affecting them.
Chief Executive Officer of Merk Foundation Dr. Rasha Kelej
She said “We will define interventions to break the stigma around infertility in general and infertile women in specific and to support girl education as Ambassadors of “Merck Foundation More Than a Mother” campaign.
Among the programs that have greatly improved the lives and welfare of communities include equal access to quality healthcare facilities, increasing capacity of doctors to serve communities with quality health facilities which she said was being done through providing specialized scholarships to over 1100 Doctors across 42 nations.
“Merk Foundation currently offers scholarship and specialist training to Doctors in the field of cancer, women health, diabetes, respiratory fields, and cardiovascular, reproductive and sexual health” Dr. Rasha Kelej explained.
The Merk Foundation Chairman Prof. Dr. Frank Stangenberg commended first ladies and health experts for the good partnership with his foundation that has improved the healthcare services in many countries.
He explained that with the strong commitment of First Ladies and collaboration with African governments, Merk Foundation has been able to register impressive results despite the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, he highlighted among other achievements that More than a Mother program has helped many women in breaking up the infertile stigma and that over 120 Doctors have been trained in fertility and reproductive health to help deal with infertility among couples.
Testimonies from across African countries benefiting from the foundation indicated that the foundation has laid a firm ground for a consistent transformation of healthcare quality with more and more Doctors across the continent attending various specialized medical training in Europe and Asian Universities.
Mrs. Esther Lungu, the First Lady of Zambia, explained that the partnership with Merk Foundation has enabled Zambia to boost the quality of healthcare through capacity building of Zambian medical Doctors that has eventually improved access to health.
African First Ladies and other participants in a virtual conference
She noted that a number of programs such as “More than A mother” program have undoubtedly contributed to the social and economic empowerment of women through empowering women and girls, facilitating girls education and creating awareness about stigmatization of infertile women.
The Merk Foundation Asia-Africa Luminary 2021 conference was attended by First Ladies from Zambia, Angola, Liberia, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central Africa Republic, DR Congo, Ghana, Guinea Mozambique, and Namibia.