End Hepatitis Now

The Melbourne Rotary Club, one of the most established and influential community organisations in Australia, has joined forces with Hepatitis Victoria/ LiverWELL ® collaborating to raise awareness about the seriousness of liver disease and the need to ‘End Hepatitis Now!’

“Rotary has an incredible history of pioneering disease elimination. Their work to help eliminate polio has changed the lives of millions of people for the better,” said Hepatitis Victoria/LiverWELL ® CEO Melanie Eagle.

“I am delighted that in the coming year our educators and lived experience speakers will present at up to 30 Rotary Clubs in Victoria, speaking to hundreds of people about the need for them to take action to fight viral hepatitis, and to get tested, vaccinated and treated.”

Melanie said the scale of the problem and its corrosive impact on health and lives is very poorly understood. “There are 30,000 Rotarians in Australia, but more than ten times that many people are living with viral hepatitis, so we must do everything we can to raise awareness,” said Melanie.

The first event - a short presentation and distribution of materials, followed by a question and answer session - took place on 22 January at the Rotary Club in Camberwell. Brighton’s Rotary Club received a similar presentation at the end of the month. A dozen other clubs have already arranged for a presentation.

HEP Hero, Mark Farmer Award winner for 2018 and lived experience speaker Andree Dolby said she was thrilled by the response of the audience at the ‘kick-off’ event.

“It’s fantastic to have the opportunity to collaborate with Rotary to encourage testing and treatment, and to spread the positive message that together we can stop viral hepatitis,” she said. Dr Peter Clark of the Melbourne Rotary Club, who has been instrumental in the Rotary/ Hepatitis Victoria/LiverWELL ® collaboration said he was very pleased with the first presentation.

“I thought the presentation materials were excellent, it was the first time I had seen them and their professionalism was evident. The feedback from all present was very positive,” he said.

“The Rotarians and their guests were clearly interested and asked a variety of questions, with one of the members even interested in becoming a HEP Hero,” Peter said.

While the COVID-19 health situation has unfortunately required Rotary to suspend their face-to-face meetings, Hepatitis Victoria will continue to work with Rotary in the short and long term to End Hepatitis Now!

Contact Martin Forrest, Hepatitis Victoria’s Health Promotion Programs Manager martin@hepvic.org.au or 03 9385 9111 to learn more.