From Joseph Amedu, Lokoja
The AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) Nigeria, has called for collective efforts to amplify girls’ voices, celebrate their accomplishments, and advocate for policies that protect their health and futures.
Dr Echey Ijezie, the AHF Nigeria Country Programme Director (CPD), made the call in a press statement made available to Journalists in Lokoja on Wednesday, as part of activities to commemorate the International Day of the Girl (IDG) 2025.
According to Ijezie, the IDG, observed annually on October 11, is a time to celebrate girls’ accomplishments, amplify their voices, and advocate for policies that protect their health and futures.
He noted that through its Girls Act program, AHF empowers girls and young women in nearly 40 countries with the knowledge, support, and resources to remain free from HIV and other STIs, adhere to treatment for girls living with HIV, stay in school, and avoid unplanned pregnancies.
He announced that the AHF Nigeria will host an educational and empowerment event at Community Commercial Secondary School Ikot Oku, Ubo, Offort, Uyo, on October 10th to help protect girls from HIV, honor their achievements, and reinforce the urgent need to expand opportunities for them to thrive and stay healthy.
“At AHF Nigeria, we are particularly concerned about the challenges that young adolescent girls are faced with – lack of access to education, poor menstrual health management, gender-based violence and a lack of access to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health (SRHR) services, which puts many young girls at risk,” Dr Ijezie stated.
Globally, adolescent girls and young women face a disproportionate HIV burden.
AHF calls for greater investment in HIV/STI prevention, testing, and treatment programs and supportive policies that expand access to healthcare, including sexual and reproductive health services, while addressing period poverty, promoting comprehensive sexuality education, and tackling the drivers of health inequality, such as gender-based violence and child marriage.
Despite progress, the numbers remain alarming. Every week, 4,000 young women aged 15–24 become newly infected with HIV, with more than 3,300 of those cases in sub-Saharan Africa.
In 2023, 1.9 million adolescent girls and young women were living with HIV, compared to 1.2 million boys and young men of the same age.
Education barriers are also severe, with 133 million girls worldwide out of school, cutting off vital pathways to future independence and healthy lives,” Dr Ijezie stated.
AHF Nigeria’s IDG event will include menstrual health management education, leadership empowerment talks, presentations by participating schools and out-of-school girls on their ideas of what girls deserves,
The Foundation will be honouring outstanding ideas with gifts as we also distribute free sanitary pads (both reusable and disposable) and link adolescent young girls to mentoring opportunities in Akwa Ibom state.
The AHF Nigeria would be joined by her CSO partners in the state, including the Civil Society for HIV/AIDS in Nigeria (CISHAN), Center for Clinical Care and Clinical Research in Nigeria (CCCRN), Excellence Community Education Welfare Scheme (ECEWS), as they expect the State AIDS and STIs Control Program (SACP) to also grace the occasion.
The Akwa Ibom State Commissioner for Women Affairs, Inibehe Silas, would be leading other government officials to the commemoration.
“AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) is a global non-profit organization providing cutting-edge medicine and advocacy to over 2.5 million people in 50 countries worldwide in the Americas, Africa, the Asia/Pacific Region, and Europe.
“We are currently the largest non-profit provider of HIV/AIDS medical care in the world,” he said.
