The Human Rights Advocacy Forum (HERAF) last week hosted a workshop in Nairobi seeking to promote the right to health for sexual minorities in Kenya. HERAF, an NGO that brings together health professionals and organizations, advocates for health as a fundamental right in Kenya. The organization brought together health workers and sexual minorities: LGBTIQ: Lesbians, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersexual and Queer people to initiate/promote dialogue between them.

Among the speakers at the workshop was Winnie Lichuma, a Commissioner at KNCHR whose presentation was titled ‘Human Rights and rights of sexual minorities’.Her presentation was very interactive; she prepared those health workers for culture shock and even invited people to share their boarding school experiences. One health worker remembered some lesbians being expelled from her school in the 1980’s.

Winnie Lichuma also read two stories from a book titled ‘Unspoken facts: a history of homosexuality in Africa’ to prove that it is not as ‘western’ or as ‘new’ as people think.

There was a heated debate as health workers tried to understand why people became attracted to others of the same sex. Most of them said they would never accept them but would give them their right to health.

We all agreed that it was the lack of information regarding gay people that has resulted in some of their health rights being violated. Additionally, health workers admitted that there was a unit in their curriculum titled, ‘Sexual deviation’ which tackled the subject of homosexuality but not in detail, even then, it was viewed as abnormal or rare and they never thought it was something so common.

One of the health workers shared an experience she had in 1990; “A HIV+ gay man came to the hospital for care and when I asked where his wife or girlfriend was, he said he had a boyfriend and he was right outside. He called him in and when they both walked in together, I walked out and only came back minutes later. But even as they spoke to me; I was just there and couldn’t even concentrate…,”she said.

A more recent example from another health worker from Thika was this; “Two men and one woman came to get tested at the centre where I work (I was sitting-in for my boss at that time). I couldn’t understand how the other man was related to the man and the woman (who were actually married) but after a few minutes of silence and confusion they explained the situation to me. The two men had been dating for a long time and the woman (who had a child with the man she’s married to) married him because of family pressure but she knew about the two men and accepted the situation. I tried to call my boss because I had no idea how to handle the situation,” she said.

Mr.Nguru Karugu of Public Health Innovations, also a GALCK (Gay & Lesbian Coalition of Kenya) consultant, spoke about safe guarding the rights of sexual minorities in Kenya. He started by pointing out the barriers they face trying to access health care including criminalization, stigma, the lack of applicable health care, forced mental treatment, violence among others.

He invited people to share their experiences and one lesbian explained how she went to a clinic for UTI treatment and was forced to get a pregnancy test inspite of stating her sexual orientation and only got treatment after the nurses surrounded her questioning her about how they do it and who does who. Which raised the question;-Do health workers need to know all this information and from whom?

“Yes! They do need to know so as to be able to know how to test for the condition and give personalized treatment,” it was concluded.

It was found that there was a knowledge gap that needed to be addressed to be able to cater for sexual minorities including the forms of sexual practices. Health workers were also advised to take the onus of responsibility themselves or use organisations like GALCK to educate health workers about the practice.

Pauline Irungu of the Global Campaign for Microbicides (GSM) also gave a presentation titled ‘Less silence, More science; Microbicides and sexual minorities.’

She highlighted the ongoing research, challenges and needs that are being addressed-tackling rectal microbicides in detail.

Attending this workshop made me realize that this topic raised more questions than it gave answers. But that’s a great start as HERAF seeks to support Akiba Uhai in promoting the fundamental right to health for sexual minorities in Kenya.