By Our Reporter
Merck, a leading science and technology company has appointed Uganda’s Minister of State for Health Sarah Opendi as the ambassador of the ‘Merck More Than a Mother’ campaign. This is in recognition of her support and efforts to reduce the stigma of infertility and raise awareness about the condition in the country.
The company also awarded Berna Amullen, a Ugandan woman, who openly shared her story of stigmatization and suffering for being infertile. The award was in recognition of her courage in creating awareness and sharing her devastating experience so that no other woman would suffer the same.
The ‘Merck More than a Mother’ campaign aims at improving access to quality and safe fertility care across the African continent. Merck is partnering with governments, parliamentarians, academia, medical community, women leaders and media to empower infertile women through improving access to information and healthcare and change of mind set.
“This campaign is a pan-African initiative aimed at building fertility capacity, raising awareness about infertility prevention and male infertility. It also opens a dialogue to define interventions to reduce the stigma and social suffering of infertile women in Africa which includes discrimination and physical and psychological violence. Countless women in Africa face fear, abuse and discrimination every day simply because they are infertile. We want to reduce the harsh social suffering of infertile women in Uganda and on the continent,
