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nine to 15 years age bracket. She said the campaign would first reach out to the girl child for now and, going forward, all children would get the HPV vaccine from the age of nine.
Meanwhile, nursing students from the Eswatini Christian Medical University (EMCU) also had a chance to meet with their colleagues from the University of IOWA, in the United States.
Collaboration
The universities have formed a collaboration and work as a team, ensuring that everyone understands the importance of the HPV vaccine and prevention of cancers caused by the HPV.
Anita Nicholson, who is the Associate Dean of Undergraduate Programmes at the University of IOWA said there needed to be teaching on the importance of cervical cancer screening for early detection.
Nicholson said they had seen the significance of cervical cancer in Eswatini since 2014.
She said they had also been fortunate to work with the Good Shepherd College of Nursing, whereby they were educating the nursing and occupational health students, as well as the EMCU.
According to Nicholson, they were in the country as part of a course known as Community Public Health, whereby they developed an innovation to work on. Nicholson said they were working with nursing colleagues in the country, supporting the need for education on the HPV vaccine.
She said they had also been fortunate to work with the Eswatini National Council Control Unit (NCCU) who shared information that the HPV vaccine would be rolled out to young women in the first round of the rollout.
EMCU Dean of Faculty of Health Science, Mlungisi Msibi, stated that the visit by the IOWA University was facilitated through the Ministry of Health and was building capacity to professional nurses.
Msibi said the University of IOWA actually did practice related to cervical cancer and HPV.
“When they see patients with cervical cancer and HPV, they need to be equipped with the knowledge to train the students on early screening.”
Msibi said early screening helped to detect the disease early in order to get the right treatment on time for a good prognosis or recovering better.
He said their student nurses needed to be equipped when they see cases and give quality information to patients when they practice, to prevent cervical cancer.