PAWAS

🌍 Global Surgery Day & Global Surgery Week 2026
📅 May 25–31, 2026

🩺 Theme:
“Systems Do Save Lives: Integrating Emergency, Critical, and Operative Care — How, When & Where It Matters Most.”

Strong surgical systems save lives.
From emergency response to critical care and safe surgery, integrated healthcare systems are essential for healthier communities and equitable access to care.

At PAWAS, we believe:
✨ Surgery is essential
✨ Access to safe care is a right
✨ Strong systems create stronger futures

This week, we celebrate the healthcare professionals, surgeons, nurses, anesthetists, and advocates working tirelessly to strengthen surgical care across Africa and beyond.

💚 Invest in people
💚 Strengthen health systems
💚 Integrate care
💚 Save lives

📸 Join the campaign experience here:
https://www.snapchat.com/lens/8c8497966c45424f931a669bfd9888bf?sender_web_id=31662bf5-4586-49bd-9186-22a5819775c8

🌍 International Day to End Obstetric Fistula
🩺 Theme: “Her Health Is a Right: Invest in Ending Fistula and Childbirth Injuries”

Every woman deserves safe pregnancy, dignified childbirth, and access to quality maternal healthcare.

Obstetric fistula is preventable and treatable — yet thousands of women and girls continue to suffer in silence due to lack of timely medical care, poverty, inequality, and limited access to skilled birth services.

Today, PAWAS stands with women across Africa and the world to:
💚 Raise awareness
💚 Advocate for maternal health rights
💚 Support prevention, treatment, and reintegration
💚 Restore dignity and hope

Ending fistula means investing in women, strengthening healthcare systems, and ensuring that no woman is left behind.

✨ Her health. Her dignity. Her future.

Dr Ncumisa Jilata — Africa’s Youngest Neurosurgeon
👩🏾‍⚕️ She became Africa’s youngest neurosurgeon at just 29 (2017)
🎓 She earned her fellowship with the College of Neurosurgeons of South Africa
🧠 She specializes in neurosurgery,
— treating conditions of the brain and spine
— advancing care in one of medicine’s most complex fields
💪🏾 She broke barriers, becoming one of only a few Black female neurosurgeons in South Africa
🌍 She inspires a new generation, showing that women can lead in highly specialized surgical fields
🏛️ She was recognized nationally, praised by President Cyril Ramaphosa for her achievements
💡 Driven by curiosity and passion, she chose the brain—“the seat and the soul”—as her life’s work
✨ She operates. She leads. She inspires.

Prof Nene Elsie Nwada Obianyo — Pioneer in Paediatric Surgery, Nigeria & West Africa
👩🏾‍⚕️ She became one of Nigeria’s first female surgeons with FRCS (1974)
🎓 She trained in Nigeria and the United Kingdom, specializing in Paediatric Surgery
🏥 She made history in 1988,
— co-leading the first successful separation of conjoined twins in Nigeria at UNTH Enugu
🏫 She broke academic barriers,
— becoming the first female Professor of Surgery in Nigeria
— and later the first female Emeritus Professor of Paediatric Surgery in West Africa
🌍 She represented Nigeria globally, serving with the World Federation of Associations of Paediatric Surgeons
🎓 She mentored and trained generations of surgeons, shaping the future of paediatric care
💪🏾 She overcame adversity, continuing her education despite the Nigerian Civil War
💡 She championed excellence, resilience, and innovation in surgery
✨ She operates. She leads. She pioneers. She inspires.