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Principle five: Vocal ambassador

You are an ambassador for all efforts to eliminate viral hepatitis, promoting action and advocating change that will help achieve ambitious goals.

Being a vocal ambassador

You translate global goals into relevant local actions, engage audiences within and outside of the medical community, and champion hepatitis elimination in your local community and networks, in all that you do.

Why?

Elimination of viral hepatitis is a global goal that will deliver benefits on many levels but can only be achieved through local and relevant actions. Sharing the message and encouraging participation across local communities and networks is essential to ensure everyone works together as part of a wider movement to end the public health threat of viral hepatitis.

What?

Achieving WHO’s 2030 targets requires the cumulative efforts of individuals and groups. Every opportunity must be taken to ensure this message reaches a wide audience, utilising a wide variety of channels including direct conversation, local, national or international meetings, social media, press coverage opportunities and more. Local actions must be realistic and achievable based on available resources. Everyone should be encouraged to share ideas and promote actions, seeking ways to involve all members of the community. Identifying a priority based on local needs (e.g., improving needle exchange services in areas with a high population of PWID) and focusing efforts in this one area is a good way to generate strong initial results and build momentum towards tackling more areas. Championing local successes (e.g., the Eastern Mediterranean Region has the highest proportion of hepatitis C patients started on treatment) is important to drive motivation.

How?

Here are three quick steps to get started:

  1. Send the monthly NOhep newsletter to your local practice and network and encourage them to sign up at www.NOhep.org.
  2. Invite local press to visit your practice to hear about the NOhep movement and any new initiatives you have launched. Consider asking selected patients if they would be willing to be involved – patient stories are a good media sell-in.
  3. Set up a local NOhep Facebook group – open to everyone both within and outside of the healthcare practice – to create a local community and a forum to share ideas, updates and activities towards the elimination of viral hepatitis.

Cami Graham, MD, MPH: How physicians can change legislation

Case study

Manal El-Sayed

Dr El-Sayed has been a strong advocate for change in Egypt and internationally. She has used her voice to fight for viral hepatitis to be recognised as a public health threat that affects the lives of millions of people, alongside the burden of the disease on the public health system through increasing the number of liver transplants due to cirrhosis of the liver or liver cancer.

Read the full case study

What next?