Opening of a 5-day intensive training on Clinical Care for Sexual Assault Survivors for Healthcare Professionals, organized by Rainbo Initiative in collaboration with the Legal Access through Women Yearning for Equality Rights & Social justice (LAWYERS), supported by Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA).

There are now only a handful of trained medical doctors providing comprehensive free medical examinations and care for rape and sexual penetration survivors in the country, with a serious constraint in prosecuting these cases when comparing the present number of trained medical practitioners dealing with rape and sexual penetration survivors to a large number of Sexual Assault cases pending in court.

This engagement seeks to address the above and will further help lawyers understand the interpretations of the medical reports issued by the Rainbo Medical Doctors after their physical examination of a survivor who had been raped or physically assaulted. This will support addressing the issue of cases being thrown out of court due to insufficient evidence on the medical certificate, thereby helping survivors access justice in the shortest possible time.

Rainbo Initiative work in partnership with other service providers of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence survivors to provide holistic support to help address the health, psychosocial, safety and protection needs of girls and women in Sierra Leone.