Weinglo Founder Shares Stage With Utah First Lady

The World Health Organization, per available statistics indicates in every 40 seconds, someone loses their life to suicide.

This worrying situation, perhaps led to Gloria Boatemaa Andoh, a Suicide Prevention Activist setting up the Weinglo Family International, Ghana.

The NGO, in its bid to ensure the campaign against suicide reaches every corner of the country, has occasionally been organizing outreach programmes for second-cycle students.

Weinglo has also provided a platform for women and young people faced with the decision of committing suicide to receive counsel from professionals and other people that matter in promoting healthy behavior and encourage young people to seek counsel at the time of difficulty.

Over the past week, the Weinglo Founder has been in the USA upon the invitation of Hope4Utah, a Suicide Prevention organization based in the State of Utah.

Set up in 2005 by a suicide prevention expert Dr. Greg Hudnall, HOPE4UTAH has been a proven success leading to the implementation of the peer-to-peer HOPE Squads in Provo schools-forever changing the district’s approach to suicide prevention. 

HOPE Squads are student groups or clubs trained to identify suicide-warning signs in their peers, and alert adults to those signs.

Gloria Boatemaa Andoh visited schools in the State of Utah that has Hope Squad Clubs including Springville High, Pleasant Grove Jr High, Orem Elementary and Scenic View Academy to learn how helpful it has been for children and parents of these students.

She was later invited by the Governor’s Wife, Utah’s First Lady Jeanette Herbert to participate in her Foundation Launch “Uplift Families” Parenting Conference at the Utah Valley Convention Center over the weekend.

The vision of Uplift Families is to "promote happiness, prosperity and societal stability through strong families and meaningful parent-child relationships." The conference united parents with resources and strategies to aid in achieving the ultimate goal: raising reliable, caring children.

Boatemaa Andoh was offered the platform to introduce Weinglo Family International to the leaders of Utah and how best they can support.

It therefore came as no surprise when guests presented gave her a standing ovation at the end of her speech; an indication that they had been clearly overwhelmed with the founder’s passion and work she was doing back home.

Weinglo and the American organization are looking at ways to partner each other by sharing ideas on how suicide prevention education can be made accessible to Ghanaians.