Fourteen young people across Victoria have become Future Healthy Community Champions, including a Keilor East resident.
Future Healthy is a project by health promotion foundation VicHealth, and will invest $45 million in new programs over three years that will aim to support people aged 0-25 years, to begin to “build back better”.
VicHealth has created the initiative in response to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on people’s health.
22-year-old Mark Yin has become a Future Health Community Champion to spread the word, and said young people have had to work hard to maintain social connection throughout the pandemic.
“What it means to socially connect has definitely narrowed,” Mr Yin said.
“Facilitating events online this past year, I could feel the Zoom fatigue, the uncertainty in people’s voices. I really feel for a lot of my peers.
“But when those couple of hours are your only chance to see other people, these online spaces become more valuable and important than ever.
“Young people are more fired up than ever – rising to the challenges of COVID and continuing to agitate for change, for cleaner and healthier conditions in which we’ll grow up and live.
“We need this energy and these voices to secure a healthy future for young people.”
If you’re a VIctorian young person aged 18-25 years, or a Victorian parent or carer with kids aged 0-17 years, you can share your experiences, challenges and ideas about what a healthy future means to you and your community for the project.
Details: futurehealthy.vichealth.vic.gov.au
