EU and UNFPA open Youth Reproductive Health Center in Mtskheta

On March 25, at the “Mtskheta Primary Health Care Center - Healthy Generation” EU/UNFPA co-funded project “Reproductive Health Initiative For Youth in the South Caucasus“ opened Youth Reproductive Health Medical-Information Center. The Youth Reproductive Health (RH) Center will provide young people with free RH counseling, contraceptives, affordable diagnostic and treatment, as well as wide range of information on reproductive health issues. The opening ceremony was attended by Mr. Otar Toidze, Head of the Parliamentary Committee of Health and Social Issues, Mr. Martin Klaucke, Head of Operations Section and Mrs. Nino Kochishvili, Project Manager, EC Delegation to Georgia, Mrs. Tamar Khomasuridze, Head of the UNFPA Georgia country Office and the representatives of local and international organizations.

“This center will address S&RH needs of young people; These services and information will be confidential high quality and free of charge. I think this is one of the major achievements of the project in this country” as Mrs. Tamar Khomasuridze, stated.

“I think information on Reproductive Health issues is very important and especially opening of centers in the regions, where information maybe is less available than in the capital or other major cities” stated Mr. Martin Klaucke.

Youth Reproductive health and Rights are one of the most essential topics in UNFPA agenda, to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Georgia

RHIYC is a large-scale multi-partner project, developed through the active participation of youth in three Caucasus countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. The project aims to build national capacities and regional partnerships to improve the sexual and reproductive health status of youth in the South Caucasus. One of the major objectives of the project is to improve the access of young people to youth-friendly reproductive health services. In the frame of this component 4 Youth RH Medical-information Centers are opened and operational and till the end of the project in total 16 youth RH Medical-information centers will be opened all over the Georgia. According to Mrs. Khomasuridze, the growing number of visits to youth-friendly Sexual and Reproductive Health centers show young generations high demand on quality Sexual and Reproductive health services .

Another important objective of RHIYC project is to increase awareness and improve knowledge on S&R Health and Rights. In the frame of this objective NGO “Tanadoma” provided the training for 18 young people on issues, related to S&R Health and Rights. These peer educators will collaborate with RH center and will share received information with their peers. 15-year-old Natia Burduli said she came to the training from Natakhtari, a village close to Mtskheta and got the information she was not aware of before. “I got a lot of information about HIV and AIDS, how they are transmitted and how we can avoid them. I also was told not to ignore and isolate people infected with AIDS,” Burduli said, “I will tell my friends what I learned here,” she added.

The participants of the training course were awarded the certificates by the honorable guests of the event.

The opening ceremony of the center was followed by town hall meeting, attended by the representatives of the civil society. The meeting was aimed at raising the awareness of the public on the importance of S&R Health and Rights in development of the country and society.