Thursday, March 14, 2013
Connecting the Dots
It is not difficult to see a common thread running between Forensic Medicine and Human Rights especially in Africa. It calls for a sustainable system that addresses many medico-legal issues which affect the totality of health, at different dimensions, of African people. The wide disparity in social strata and the high level of poverty and disadvantaged populations on the continent call for a concerted efforts by governments, institutions, agencies, and practitioners to view their roles from a Human Rights perspective and put in place at least basic environment that will address the crippling inequalities which are prevalent in our communities. Sexual Violence, Injury Interpretation, Custodial Medicine, Management of the Dead following Disasters/Disaster Victim Identification (DVI), Medical Evidence etc, are subjects that need to be properly directed with appropriate reference to optimal facilities and expertise in medicine, the judiciary, the police, social work and supporting sciences. This blog is dedicated to sharing ideas and action points with persons, institutions or agencies that are interested in bringing about a positive change in Africa through the instrument of appropriate Forensic Medicine Practice and Human Rights Advocacy. Until what we do in our offices, laboratories and institutions translate into improving the lives of our people and upholding their dignity, the relevance of our endeavours to humanity will be called to question. This is what I call "minimum standard" for evaluating the essence of our activities and relevance to our communities.
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Sir, I solely agree to all that you have said. Indeed, you have said it all.
ReplyDeleteBorrowing your words "Until what we do in our offices, laboratories and institutions translate into improving the lives of our people and upholding their dignity, the relevance of our endeavours to humanity will be called to question", the way you said it, reminds me of the needs to research into secondary victimization of sexually assaulted victims in this country.
This is an area of investigation that I believe affect all both directly and indirectly. As a result of which a better understand of this is needed because being a victim of any form of sexual assault is tagged primary victimization. when it is further revisited on the victims both directly and indirectly, it is called secondary victimization.This is the a common dot running between Forensic Medicine (sexual assault e.g. rape and so on) and Human Rights (activist questioning on victims) especially in Nigeria and the rest of the world.
Bless you for this discussion.
Yes, you've made a valid point and we must all be spurred into action in our various corners to prevent sexual violence and where it occurs, to ensure that survivors are appropriately looked after while the alleged perpetrator(s) face justice.
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