Christoforos is a global health enthusiast and a future physician who aspires to advocate for public health and empower other students all around the world to actively participate in healthcare matters. He believes that within non-formal as well as peer-to-peer education, more young people will not only self-develop but also enhance their skills and be further motivated to work on Public Health for the ultimate vision of achieving safe and high quality healthcare access for all people worldwide. His project aims to concern everyone for needed of Global Health.

Christoforos was selected for the project “European Youth at the frontlines of active citizenship: A Roadmap towards a collective South-North-East-West Momentum” organized by Volunteers Centre Skopje and supported by European Commission due to Erasmus+ European Youth Together programme.

Do you believe that Global Health is a matter that should concern everyone?

– Global health is for everyone so I believe that it should concern everyone! As defined Global Health is ‘the area of study, research and practice that places a priority on improving health and achieving equity in health for all people worldwide’. People tend to be more active in discussions and actions for healthcare only when they are personally affected. Especially this year is just another reminder for all of us that everyone should be advocating for public health, especially healthcare professionals since mental and physical well-being doesn’t have any borders and prevention can’t be achieved if only a handful of people advocate for it.

What are the main obstacles that you face in planning such projects?

– One of the main obstacles is the fact that nowadays young people tend to be overwhelmed with their responsibilities and especially our main target group which is students/young healthcare professionals, they are usually difficult to approach because of the workload that they already have. It is much more difficult trying to affect them and motivate them to advocate for public health in such circumstances but then again, it is essential. As young people trying to ‘change the world’ or at least bring a new perspective and empower others to understand it, it’s usually also difficult to be heard especially from decision-making bodies and professionals that have been working on the same field for years tend to neglect our passion and ideas.

In which ways do you think that more young people will get involved?

– Young people have a lot of ideas and passion and usually they just need an initiative or a direction to help them put their plans into action and collaborate with others so they can have a bigger impact in what they want to achieve. I believe that a way to attract more young people is to have the capacity and the determination to show them which are the issues that we are trying to tackle and the benefits by doing so. We should be able to communicate with our peers in the language that we all use these days, and this is why social media and technology should be a huge part of our work. We should stick together because as organized groups we can share our skills and motivate each other.

Christoforos Hadjiandreas