African First Ladies Health Summit, Day 2

Apr 24th, 2009 2:32 PM UTC
By Virginia Simmons

LA-based super ONE volunteer Amy Quinn blogged about the First Ladies Heath Summit, a gathering of First ladies from across Africa who met with top global health experts on April 21 and 22 in a first-ever U.S. summit to develop and improve locally-run programs that benefit mothers and children throughout the African continent. Below she talks about day 2.

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, take others with you.” (African Wisdom)

This idea of a woman’s power and solidarity amongst women rang out on day two of the African First Ladies Health Summit held at the Skirball Center in Los Angeles on April 21. Panels and discussion ran back to back as First Ladies joined various leading experts in global disease, maternal health and education.

As I listened carefully to each of the speakers, I kept hearing this word, “distance”.

There was a lot of discussion about the problem of distance to skilled emergency care and skilled pre and post-natal care as it directly relates to maternal mortality and again, how maternal health is the “keystone” to achieving all of the other Millennium Development Goals

H.E. Mathato Mosisili, First Lady of Lesotho, stated sadly that 23% of people in Lesotho are infected with HIV/AIDS and that 54% of the people live in poverty. Some women have to walk over 50km to get to the nearest clinic to seek emergency care. There is a desperate need for more “Mother Houses” so that these women can seek medical care closer to home. The distance that people must travel for treatment is one of the primary reasons that people infected with HIV and AIDS are not able to adhere to their anti-retroviral treatment.

Monir Islam, the Director of Making Pregnancy Safer at the World Health Organization really focused on this issue of distance to emergency care. He told us that the number one cause of maternal mortality in Africa is hemorrhage. When a woman hemorrhages, you have only two hours to save her life. He asked the First Ladies- “can you save a life at home?” He challenged them to recall where they delivered their children and to think about where their children will deliver their children. Do they not want the same health care for all the women of Africa that they themselves received? He challenged them to, “Be bold! Challenge your politicians. Mothers should have the right to the best care. We need the political will and the investment.”

H.E. Thandiwe Banda of Zambia talked at great length about the distance to skilled health care. Only 3% of Zambia is on the electric grid. “Sometimes,” she said, “a woman dies because her heath attendant does not have a bicycle – which costs $85.” This moved me because that woman who died because her health care provider could not get to her – what is her life worth? Is it not worth at the very least the $85 bicycle? Perhaps I am simplifying it. I don’t know.

Lynn Freeman, Director of Averting Maternal Death and Disability Program at Columbia University remarked, “Death in pregnancy and childbirth is deeply and profoundly political. It is not a disease. It is not “new” or “fate” or a “function of nature”. Today, virtually every maternal death can be avoided with the proper interventions. Death in pregnancy and childbirth is “man-made” and the solutions are within our grasp. Maternal mortality is not Africa or Asia’s problem – it is the world’s problem. In Africa, 1 in 6 mothers will die in childbirth. In the United States, the maternal morality ratio is 1 in 5000 and in some countries it’s 1 in 47,000. She called on First Ladies to make the issues visible by visiting local and rural health clinics again and again and shining the spotlight on them. She asked them to demand accountability and have zero tolerance for sub-standard health care. The death of a woman in childbirth does not “just happen”.

H.E. Dr. Hajiya Turai Umaru Yar’Adua of Nigeria told us that a woman in some parts of Africa must ask permission from her husband to go to the hospital. She talked of how they had begun to institute a small ambulance program in which the ambulance would go to the women rather than the women try to figure out a way to get to them.

France Donnay of the Gates Foundation stressed the joy of birth. We should do all we can to ensure the safety and joy of childbirth. The birth of a child only happens once. We are all only born once. Pregnant women only die of a few things and it should be the policy of national plans and programs to address those few things and then follow up to make sure our plans are working.

This theme of maternal health and mortality was echoed by nearly every participant including Sarah Brown, wife of Prime Minister of Great Britain Gordon Brown, and a dedicated champion for the international maternal mortality campaign. In one of many thoughtful statements, she said, we want to work with you to “create a reality where people in your country not only survive, but prosper.” She believes, as many do, that maternal health are the key to all of the MDGs. Without the survival of the mother, none of the other MDGs can be achieved. “A mother’s place is everywhere and always has been,” she remarked. She ensured that if we “build (a health care system) for mothers… you build for everyone.” Sarah Brown’s full keynote speech can be found at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sarah-brown/build-for-mothers-and-you_b_189527.html.

-Amy Quinn, ONE Volunteer, Los Angeles

TAGS: ONE, Women ONE2ONE, Women and Leadership