Earlier in the year, Gede held a Board meeting, during which a globally renowned mental health expert (and new Board Member), Dr Brandon Kohrt (http://globalhealth.duke.edu/people/faculty/kohrt-brandon), shared in the same view of engaging the diaspora to train facility based health workers as a way of addressing the 'treatment gap' existing in care and management of those accessing HIV-AIDS services.

During the same meeting, a long-standing Board Member Dr Yoku Shawtaylor has this to say-‘I have been a Board Member of the Gede Foundation for several years now and I am encouraged by the strides we have taken over the past 10 years to bring health services to the most vulnerable in our communities. Our health delivery services for AIDS-HIV treatment and ancillary support for education were innovative and trail-blazing. When we embarked on AIDS-HIV services, we were pioneers in Nigeria and West Africa for that matter. We made an impact through outreach, treatment services and social support for the most needy.

Now, Gede Foundation has mustered the chutzpah to confront another health issue that has long been neglected in our communities. Our focus on mental health aims to shed the requisite light on the lack of services and problems of access within our communities for mental health services. What is more important, we are trying to create an open dialogue about mental health – to foster greater understanding about mental health care and to focus more attention on how we can provide better care to those who need it. Join us in this endeavor’.