Baby Makes 3 wins VicHealth’s Outstanding Health Promotion Award

We are excited to share that our Baby Makes 3 health promotion initiative is the winner of VicHealth’s Outstanding Health Promotion Award! This category of the Victorian Health Promotion Awards recognises a health promotion organisation or program that was able to be flexible, innovative and successful in supporting Victorians to improve their health and quality of life.

Baby Makes 3 – Supporting families to thrive, was successful in receiving the 2022 award as they rose above the challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic to deliver a year of incredible program evolution and strategic growth, delivering important mental health and wellbeing benefits to more first-time parents across Victoria than ever before, particularly those from vulnerable, marginalised and ‘hard to reach’ communities.

The impact of COVID-19 starkly illustrated unequal parenting roles with the burden of housework and childcare, and particularly home schooling, falling to mothers. The pandemic triggered an increase in the numbers of new parents contacting Beyond Blue, PANDA and the Gidget Foundation for mental health support. Tragically, the incidence of family violence also increased. Consequently, the work of Baby Makes 3 has never been more important and with this award, is on its way to being duly recognised for its significant impact.

Up to 48,200 families benefited from Baby Makes 3 initiatives during this year, with the team developing new partnerships, a deeper focus on influencing systems and settings to support large-scale sustainable change, adapting the range of training and education programs to be delivered remotely and developing new programs and resources, co-designed with organisations with specific cultural expertise for culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) groups and Aboriginal community groups.  Baby Makes 3 also supported 33 local governments, 12 community service organisations and 17 hospitals. 

This all underpinned a year of impressive results, along with many years of ongoing program development, and solidifies this award recognition. 

Congratulations to the Baby Makes 3 team; Anita, Olive, Sulochana, Bronwyn, Heidi and Rachael for this incredible achievement. A thank you also goes to John (pictured in the middle in the image below) who contributed to the development of our award submission.

The awards night was held on 13 February 2023 and we thank the organisers for hosting a wonderful event. 

About Baby Makes 3

healthAbility’s Baby Makes 3 is an evidence-based, education and social change initiative to build gender equality. As a health promotion intervention, Baby Makes 3 shapes long-term attitudes and social norms about parenting by challenging traditional gendered expectations of becoming a parent.

It builds mutual understanding, appreciation and respect among first-time parents as well, as the capacity of antenatal and postnatal services’ staff, structures and systems to promote gender equality by examining the gendered expectations of becoming a parent.

Find out more on the Baby Makes 3 page or email babymakes3@healthability.org.au.

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