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Aahung: Multiplying its Impact
"What we often find when we go into communities are people who are desperate for information."
- Aahung Director Rahal Saeed
In Pakistan, IWHC supports Aahung, a sexual health resource center based in Karachi. Since its inception in 1995, Aahung's mission has evolved based on one important and simple idea: Community institutions like government bodies, schools, and health clinics can reach far more people with sexual health information and services than Aahung can on its own. Aahung provides these institutions with the motivation and training to do so.
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Homeopathy students enacting
a role play as part of Aahung's
Clinical program.
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Pakistan's 40 million adolescents--as well as many adults--lack basic information on sexuality and reproduction and face significant obstacles to accessing health services.
As Director Rahal Saeed describes, "What we often find when we go into communities are people who are desperate for information. Everyone's body changes, and there is no one to go to with questions in Pakistan. Much of the time we're very well received by groups and communities, because there is finally someone there to talk to them without judging them."
Aahung Program Manager Fatima Haider adds, "Aahung was, and probably still is, the only organization in Pakistan that purely addresses issues relating to sex and sexuality."
Aahung is currently working at four levels to equip communities throughout Pakistan, including in some of the most remote and conservative areas, with the tools they need to promote sexual and reproductive health.
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The Life Skills Education program advocates for sexual health courses in schools and works with community-based organizations, schools, and teachers to design and implement such courses, building on nearly a decade of work with young people. For example, they have successfully lobbied both Catholic and Muslim school boards in Pakistan to include their life skills education materials in curricula. Aahung also connects educators across Pakistan in a forum for discussion and idea-sharing.
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Through the Clinical program, Aahung conducts seminars and meets with medical professionals--including homeopaths--in order to convince them of the need for including rights-based sexual health services in clinics and in medical school curricula (see above photo).
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The Research, Law, and Policy program educates legal professionals, law enforcement communities, legislators, and policymakers on issues of sexual health and rights. Aahung holds trainings for legal personnel and works with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the legal sector.
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As part of the Outreach program, staff collaborate with community-based organizations to improve awareness of sexual rights and health in areas where information is relatively unavailable. In the remote village of Johi, for example, where significant illiteracy prevented use of Aahung's written Sexual Health Manual, trainers invented an educational theatre program whose performances drew hundreds of spectators. This Theatre for Development has been a successful tool for almost two years.
Change occurs at many levels as a result of Aahung's outreach. Fatima Haider notes, "In rural communities, where often girls would not even be allowed to leave their homes, the life skills program has helped integrate them into the external society-through things like participating in theater groups, performing in public spaces. They are raising awareness in their communities and promoting health and rights among their peers and families."
Learn more about Aahung
Visit Aahung's website>>
Read IWHC's interview with Aahung Director Rahal Saeed>>
Read IWHC's interview with Aahung Program Manager Fatima Haider, a Young Visionary>>
Page last updated 8/21/07.
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