Sunday March 2, Federation Square, Melbourne

Amongst the striking architecture of Melbourne’s Federation square, hundreds gathered to support and spread awareness about Hepatitis B in the community. It was a joint event run by a few organisations, including the ACMAV (Australian Chinese Medical Association in Victoria), Hepatitis Heroes and Team HBV, an initiative run by a group of passionate medical students in Melbourne. 

These students, mainly post-graduates from Melbourne university and Austin Hospital, have been working on various projects over the last year to further community education of Hepatitis B, and are in the process of becoming a chapter of the Stanford University Team HBV/Jade Ribbon group. As a growing Melbourne Team HBV faction, they aspire to one day link up with other states as a united Australian Jade Ribbon chapter.

The Jade Ribbon campaign, symbolised by a jade-turquoise coloured ribbon artfully designed in the shape of the Chinese character for “person”, represents the movement of people “united against Hepatitis B Virus and liver cancer”. Part of a growing global movement, this campaign aims to raise awareness about the danger and high prevalence of Hepatitis B amongst at-risk demographic groups. This predominantly refers to those people born overseas in areas where Hepatitis B vaccines are not part of the national immunisation program, or where there is little information available about the transmission and consequences of HBV. Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe and South America are amongst the identified risk groups who are strongly urged to be screened for HBV.

Mum was there to give a short talk at the rally as the representative (President) of KAMS (Korean Australian medical society), as well as to support and learn from the volunteer activity in Melbourne. I was essentially there to ghost her, document the movement, and to learn and create a partnership with the student volunteers in Melbourne.

It was inspiring to see the sheer numbers who gathered in federation square that morning. Members of the community who came to support the cause, many of whom had wandered through by chance. The student volunteers were united by their Jade-ribbon shirts, and disseminated into the crowd as if on street patrol: handing out brochures, informing the public about the nature of, vaccination and screening for HBV, and gathering signatures for a petition for government-supported screening of HBV in Victoria.

The medical students were passionate about the cause and willing to get out there and pitch in. In preparation for the event, Team HBV had created shirt and poster designs, created an educational slide-set to project onto the huge screen in Federation square, and gathered volunteers to be around on the day. Last year they had also created a documentary in which they interviewed Hepatitis patients, snippets of this student-made video were also playing on the big screen. 

I pulled a Jade ribbon tee-shirt over my head, and spent some time helping out in what the other volunteers were doing: promoting HBV awareness in the community. The process of talking about HBV with others helped to consolidate my own understanding of the viral infection…proof that teaching is the best form of learning. And seeing the photo slideshow of photos from our PNG trip rolling through on the big screen wasn’t bad either (!!).

I was told by a teacher at the Melbourne Chinese Ethnic School (a multicultural centre for the teaching of Chinese language) that the school received regular visits from a doctor who encouraged and taught parents to do Taichi (Chinese shadowboxing”) for health, and talked to the teachers and students about their health. 

The children, even given a short week’s notice for the event, had created a series of posters about HBV and liver, in both Chinese and English. Even if the young’uns contributed by cutting out a picture of the liver and sticking it on the cardboard, it was an important process of being part of health awareness, and meant that they were aware of issues like HBV from a young age. 

The presence of the volunteers and atmosphere of the event was a testament to a spirit of giving and initiative demonstrated throughout this Melbourne community. The ACMAV (unlike the Sydney group) seemed to be so involved in community education programs. And it seemed like almost every Melbournian I approached was happy to sign the HBV screening petition, or find out a little more about HBV. There were many moments throughout the day that I threw up my hands and questioned why we were lacking this in Sydney?! Or is there a whole movement already existent in Sydney that I'm not even aware of?

The Melbourne launch in Federation square was a collaborative effort that promoted community health education on a grass-roots level: essentially rallying a group of passionate volunteers to disseminate information through a street patrol. It didn’t seem like anything that we couldn’t replicate in Sydney…using street teams of Hepatitis B Free uni students to volunteer at Hepatitis B Free events. 

We’re not looking at miracles here: how much media coverage have we seen for movements like HIV/AIDS, breast cancer, lung cancer, skin cancer etc.? And I believe that when there’s a job to be done, there’ll be good people ready and willing to work together to get it done.

Carrie