“Statistics show a sharp increase in reported cases of violence against women and the Kasur Health Department is making efforts to curb the resultant adverse impact on victims’ health,” said Health Executive District Officer (EDO) Kasur Dr Saeedullah Khan on Thursday.
The EDO was addressing the opening session of a 3-day training course for Health Service Providers including district health officers, women medical officers (WMOs) from the Rural Health Centres (RHCs), medico-legal officers and health managers in Kasur.
The training was conducted on the Gender-Based Violence Response (GBV) Guidelines developed by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The course titled “Training and Outreach Programme to End Gender-based Violence” was held in Kasur under the Basic Development Needs Programme by the Kasur District Government Health Department. It received technical backstopping from the WHO and financial support from the Gender Justice and Protection Programme and the UKAID.
The focus of the training was to educate health service providers for sensitive response towards survivors of gender-based violence at health care facility level so that the health-related problems of victims could eventually be reduced. In the end, the participants identified their role as first contact points for community outreach in prevention of GBV incidences by raising community awareness. Gender Specialist from WHO-Pakistan Masooma Butt designed and conducted the training course to provide committed technical support from the agency.
Director Headquarters Dr Zulfiqar Ahmed and MNCH Director Dr Tasneem Zia, from the office of Punjab health director general, participated in the closing session of the training held yesterday to represent commitment and support from the provincial health department.
