Community workers say cultural and educational barriers mean some emerging African migrant communities are struggling to address key health issues.
Some are calling for more health information and services to be made available in languages other than English.
But they say there's also a need to do more to encourage members of emerging communities to recognise health problems, and to seek help to deal with them.
Greg Dyett reports.
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Adamu Tefera is an Ethiopian-born Intercultural Development Officer with the city council in the outer Melbourne suburb of Melton.
He sees under-treatment of mental health as one of the major problems among new settlers from Africa.
Mr Tefera says traditional perceptions of mental illness often mean people avoid seeking help until it's too late.
"Cultural perception of mental illness is different from the western medical perception. For example, the belief of causation is, one of them is, for mental health issues, the cause is spiritual and the remedy should be also supernatural. Because of this, people are not seeking help."
New South Wales Police Multicultural Community Liaison Officer Assefa Bekele says both mental and physical health are often ignored by new migrants and refugees, as they focus on basic needs, such as employment and child rearing.
"They don't see health issue. As long as we are walking, we are, you know, smiling, whatever, they don't think that there is another issue and they don't give it priority."
New South Wales Public Health Officer Doctor Mohamed Keynan says better health education programs are needed for African migrants and refugees.
He says there's a need for general information about women's health, mental health, and issues such as weight problems.
Doctor Keynan says some communities also have quite specific health issues that need attention - such as the consequences of the practice known as Female Genital Mutilation in Somali communities.
"Most of the Somali women actually had FGM, female genital mutilation, and, and having a baby is a big issue in Australia... and some of the nurses who never witnessed about those kind of issues have some problem of understanding about the whole issue of FGM."
Assefa Bekele from the NSW Police doesn't think there's a shortage of health information for emerging African communities.
However, he says little progress can be made until people come forward.
"Information is everywhere. People need to come out and to gather information about their health, about their family's health, as well as about the community's health."
Public Health Officer Doctor Mohamed Keynan would like to see more health information available in African languages other than English.
But he stresses that this has to go beyond printed material.
He says for example, members of the Somali community, some of whom are illiterate, need to receive information orally.
"I don't think that many people, even if I give the information, will go home and read those information... People they, they hear. You know it's just a talking, talking community. Here they don't read."
The Melbourne-based Multicultural Centre for Women's Health says it often helps if African community women can get together to discuss health issues.
Executive director Adele Murdolo says she's found that African migrant and refugee women are willing to talk, even about controversial issues such as sexual health, and same-sex relationships.
But she says there are few venues available where they feel they can safely receive information and share experiences.
"So I think that's the key. Providing an opportunity for women to talk together about the issues that concern them in their language, facilitated by somebody who's able to create a non-judgemental environment and is also able to provide some really good information that goes along with that topic."
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