Breakthrough Action, USAID's social and behavior change project, which encourages people to adopt healthier behaviors, has reached out to more than 30,000 people since it launched a COVID-19 awareness campaign in February 2021 in the sub-prefecture of Samoé, in the Prefecture of N’Zérékoré.

Initially reluctant to support the presence of humanitarian assistance in their communities because of widespread misinformation on the Covid-19 and Ebola vaccines, many people had refused to attend awareness sessions.

The Breakthrough Action project in collaboration with the health authorities put in place a series of preventive measures, including distribution of health kits and door-to-door visits by community health educators to deliver prevention messages.

To convince people to attend awareness sessions, Breakthrough Action employed members of the same communities, who speak the same language and have the appropriate cultural understanding, to conduct the sessions.  Unlike broadcast messages, in-person encounters through door-to-door campaigns allow people to ask questions and seek clarification.  However, one of the main shortcomings of these campaigns is their limited reach.  Breakthrough Action, through the local health authorities of Samoé, therefore supported the broadcast of outreach messages through community radio stations and set up a call center to complement the door-to-door campaign.  This outreach and risk communication campaign was carried out by village chiefs, neighborhood leaders, and health workers who volunteered to participate in the door-to-door campaign in Samoé.   “Their participation inspires confidence in families and facilitates the transmission of messages and the collection of information from households,” explains Charles Loty Goumou, an Ebola advisor at Breakthrough Action.

Exchanges on the origin of Covid-19 and the recent Ebola virus to recognize the symptoms, potential spread, and ways to protect oneself, are some of the main aspects covered during the awareness sessions.  It is one of the preventive measures - physical distancing - that raises the most questions.  "We are so used to community life and sharing that it is impossible to make people understand that they must keep away from each other to prevent infection,” explains Goumou.  “We try as much as possible to explain why this is important, but it is part of our life and it is very difficult to make people change.  I feel very relieved to see that the message was understood, as I walk past a house where I had met and sensitized the family and see changes such as the presence of a bucket for washing hands. It shows that I was not preaching in the desert,” he continues.

"Thanks to these awareness sessions, almost all the people of Samoé are now vaccinated against Covid-19 and the Ebola virus without posing any resistance," Goumou concludes.

 

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A resident of the sub-prefecture of Samoé educates market vendors on the importance of using sanitary kits to prevent Covid-19 and the Ebola virus disease. Photo Credit: Ousmane Condé, USAID Guinea
Ousmane Conde, USAID Guinea
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