‘HERO’ launched to promote child health education in rural areas

  Bangla Press Desk:  A community-based health development project titled Hygiene Education Reaches Out (HERO) has been launched to promote sustainable hand hygiene and basic health awareness among primary school students and their families in the country’s rural areas. The six-month pilot programme was officially inaugurated on Sunday at Sayera Government Primary School in Bagerhat through the distribution of WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) materials. The project is being implemented by Colab – Connecting Communities Through Communication, a local volunteer non-profit organisation.

Jahed Bin Anis, co-founder of Colab and a student at Dhaka University, said the pilot programme aims to bring sustainable behavioural changes among children, their families and the local community.

"Through this project, we are working to bring permanent behavioural changes among children, their families, and the local community," Jahed said. The organisation’s founder and project lead Salman Shakil, a student of the School of Media and Strategic Communications at Oklahoma State University in the United States, said the initiative uses social marketing tools to foster sustainable health practices and can serve as a model. "The main objective of our HERO project is to create a proven model for partnership with national and international organisations through behavioural change and health outcome monitoring," Salman said. "Over the six months, we will supply WASH products to students and monitor their impact on the students, their families and surrounding communities," he added, noting that while the initiative is currently being rolled out on a limited scale, there are plans to expand it across the country.

Under the project, free handwashing facilities have been provided to 50 students of the school. Communication materials will also be used to raise awareness about basic health education among around 1,000 families during the project period. The Sunday afternoon programme was attended by school teacher Tulip Biswas, Md Nazmul Huda, Rupa Baroi, Shawon Dash, and students of classes III to V. This article was originally published on Daily Sun.

Bangla Press is a global platform for free thought. It provides impartial news, analysis, and commentary for independent-minded individuals. Our goal is to bring about positive change, which is more important today than ever before.

  B P/SP