Emelia Naa Ayeley Aryee/ Freelance Journalist
Xoese Ghana, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) with focus on empowering women, promoting girls’ education, and child protection, has put plans in place to mark the 2023 PCOS Awareness month with an event.
The event is in line with Xoese Ghana’s flagship programme and vision to end infertility stigma against women and childless couples.
It has been slated for Wednesday, September 2023, at the Christ The King Parish in Accra.
The event which has the theme: “Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome: Enlightening Toward an Infertility Stigma-free Society”, will take off at 8:30 in the morning.
Xoese Ghana’s PCOS Awareness creation
In an interview with Amaghanaonline.com, the Director of Xoese Ghana, Emelia Naa Ayeley Aryee, underscored the need for the awareness creation.
She noted that PCOS is a leading cause of infertility in women, however, unfortunately, the victims are not aware of the presence of the condition in their bodies because of little to no information on PCOS.
Therefore, with September being the PCOS Awareness Month, Xoese Ghana found it an opportune time to create awareness and also sensitise women and couples on the condition.
Ms. Aryee asserted that many women need help, given a revelation by the World Health Organisation (WHO) that worldwide, 8-13% of women of reproductive age have PCOS.
“And the most alarming of the disclosure is that 70% of the women have been undiagnosed. These are the women we need to find in our part of the world, Ghana, to help,” she said emphatically.
She added that the lack of knowledge and information-sharing on this condition is the first thing that is hampering the women’s chances to conceive, hence, the need to inform and equip as many women as possible on the condition.
Medical team
It is in this vein that Xoese Ghana has put together an experienced medical team in the area of women and fertility to facilitate the event.
They are Dr. Yaa Owusu Baah, the Medical Director of Tema Women’s Hospital; and Dr. Samuel Gyedu Owusu of the LEKMA Hospital in Teshie, Accra.
It will be an interactive one with presentations on the condition and infertility as a whole. Participants will be given the room to ask questions.
The Xoese Ghana 2023 PCOS Awareness Seminar is being organised by the kind support of Yango Ghana, currently Ghana’s safest, most reliable, and affordable ride-hailing app; Tema Women’s Hospital; Institute for Liberty and Policy Innovation (ILAPI), and Missing Children Ghana.
The organisation invites all women with or without fertility issues, men and fathers with wives and daughters who have fertility issues, and members of the general public to take part in the Xoese Ghana 2023 PCOS Awareness Seminar.
About Xoese Ghana
Xoese Ghana is a non-governmental organisation founded and led by award-winning journalist, and gender advocate Emelia Naa Ayeley Aryee. Xoese, pronounced “Horsey”, means “Believe”, and the organisation seeks to encourage women faced with infertility stigma to believe that it will soon end.
The not-for-profit organisation focuses on women, girls, and children.
For women, Xoese Ghana prioritises women’s reproductive health. We are currently on a project to end the stigma associated with infertility.
Infertility, as you may be already aware, aside from the untold psychological trauma it brings to its victims, also requires financial muscles for treatment.
Despite the sufferings these women go through, there is also a social stigma that worsens their plight. This is what Xoese Ghana seeks to champion – to provide needed support for women struggling with infertility.
For girls, Xoese Ghana, in 2021, embarked on a campaign to end child marriage. We took this campaign to Akwateakwaso, a community in Adawso, a town in Koforidua, where 17-year-old girl Beatrice Kenyo, was saved from early marriage.
In that town, girls who get pregnant at teenage are married off. However, thanks to Xoese Ghana, Beatrice’s case was different.
For children as a whole, Xoese Ghana intends to embark on various advocacy campaigns in the areas of child hunger, child literacy, climate change, and others to improve the lives of children.
