Kenya
ONE Mom Amy Graff reflects on her week in Kenya with nine other American mom bloggers.
Now that I’m back from my week-long trip through Kenya, everyone wants to know, “How was it?” I find myself using words such as “amazing,” “life-changing,” “intense,” and “powerful.”
But really there’s no way to summarize the experience in a few words or in a tidy, little paragraph. My mental scrapbook from the trip is filled with a jumble of facts and figures, impressions and thoughts. When combined together, this tangled mess amounts to the most memorable and meaningful week of my life. On paper it looks like the random list below.
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This week, ONE is joining 10 bloggers who are making their way through Kenya to see what life is really like for moms in the developing world. Follow along and check their progress at http://one.org/us/actnow/moms.
Today was a pretty amazing day here in Kenya. We met with Kenyan entrepreneurs this morning, and a representative from USAID, which is deeply invested in building Africa’s world presence as an exporter.
Then this afternoon, we spent time in Kibera, one of Nairobi’s most well-known kagigis, or slums. The two are linked in my mind, because I think it is the first that will eventually help lift the circumstances of the second.
I heard a Kenyan joke today, “We don’t have oil here in Kenya — our people are are main exports.” We all laughed, but the truth is, though Kenya has many great natural resources, the people are an amazing asset. I have yet to meet an ordinary person. The energy, creativity, and enthusiasm they’ve given us with on this trip simply astonish me. And I don’t think they’re putting on brilliance for the out-of-towners, you really can’t fake this level of extraordinary-ness.
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This week, ONE is joining 10 bloggers who are making their way through Kenya to see what life is really like for moms in the developing world. While in Kenya, the 10 bloggers will be checking in regularly with accounts of what they’re seeing and hearing, as well as daily actions tied to their trips and access to experts who can explain the key issues these women will see firsthand. Follow along and check their progress at http://one.org/us/actnow/moms
Doris is a tall, thin woman with sweet, smiling eyes and skin the color of dark, rich chocolate. When I meet her at the Siaya Clinical Research Center in western Kenya, she’s sitting peacefully outside in a plastic deck chair cradling a baby whose thighs are dimpled and cheeks chubby. She’s 27 years old, and she’s HIV positive.
But what about her child? Is her 3-month-old son, Joel, also positive? That’s the first question that comes into my mind.
The answer is no, thanks to several studies aimed at fighting disease that are underway at this remarkable hospital situated in an area of the country where disease is especially prevalent. While the HIV rate throughout Kenya is 6 percent, it’s 15 percent here in the Nyanza Province.
When Doris arrived at the clinic pregnant and HIV positive, doctors entered her into a research program that allowed her to receive free medication, specifically ARVs, that decreases transmission of HIV from mother to child.
“It’s a joy to see a baby come out negative from a positive mother,” says Lilian Odhiambo, a nurse at Siaya. “Cases like this show that there’s hope.”
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This week, ONE is joining 10 bloggers who are making their way through Kenya to see what life is really like for moms in the developing world. While in Kenya, the 10 bloggers will be checking in regularly with accounts of what they’re seeing and hearing, as well as daily actions tied to their trips and access to experts who can explain the key issues these women will see firsthand. Follow along and check their progress at http://one.org/us/actnow/moms
After 24 hours of travel, we arrived in Nairobi late Sunday evening, and made a beeline for our beds to get some rest before hitting the ground running bright and early on Monday morning. We made our way back to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport at 7 a.m. to take an early domestic flight to Kisumu, Kenya’s third largest city, on the shores of Lake Victoria. Though I didn’t know this before, Kisumu and its surrounding Nyanza province is Ground Zero when it comes to infectious diseases: HIV, tuberculosis and malaria, among others, are endemic in the aria, and the highest prevalence in Kenya is found in this region. It also happens to be one of the poorest regions in the country.
We were here specifically to witness the work that the United States Center for Disease Control is doing in collaboration with the Kenya Medical Research Institute (also known as KEMRI), the scientific research arm of Kenya’s Ministry of Health. On this particular day, we split up into groups of two, to shadow HIV home health care workers: KEMRI’s representatives who travel throughout the region, testing families for HIV, and counseling them on how to reduce the spread of the disease. Because many of the families in the region live in relatively remote rural areas, it can be different (and somewhat discouraging) to travel the long distances on foot to get to the clinics to determine their status — and so instead, KEMRI and the CDC come to them.
My travel companion for the day, Amy Graff, and I were quickly paired with two health care counselors who were consummate professionals: Sam, and jovial and passionate young man with a great smile, and Grace, his more reserved, no-nonsense counterpart. After they briefed us on what we were about to experience, we set out:
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View of Kibera from the railroad tracks. Photo credit: Morgana Wingard/ONE
After more than 20 hours of flight time and a full day of travel time, we have made it Nairobi, Kenya. All of us here on the ground are exhausted, but excited about the upcoming week. We can’t wait to share it all with you.
This trip is the first step in the development of what we hope will be long-term relationships with thousands of American moms who have the power to help save millions of lives through simple actions they can take in between the carpools, day jobs, homework help and other activities in their daily lives.
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Tabitha and her son, John, in Kenya. Photo courtesy of Riccardo Gangale for GAVI.
From July 23 to 30, ONE will be taking 10 mom bloggers to Kenya to experience issues that women living in extreme poverty face every day. These moms will be experiencing the issues of extreme poverty as told through the lens of a mother in Africa –- from shadowing health care workers to meeting with female farmers to visiting one of Africa’s largest urban slums. As a result, we hope they bring that awareness back home and share their lessons with other moms in their community.
Here are the 10 lucky mom bloggers traveling to Kenya:
Karen Walrond, Chookooloonks @Chookooloonks
Amy Graff, BabyCenter/Momformation @babycenter
Jennifer James, The Mom Bloggers Club @mombloggersclub
Cooper Munroe, The Motherhood @coopermunroe
Emily McKhann, The Motherhood @emilymckhann
Lindsay Maines, Rock and Roll Mama @rockandrollmama
Jyl Pattee, Mom It Forward @momitforward
Rachel Fox, Coming Alive @rachelonefox
Shayne Moore, Global Soccer Mom @globalsoccermom
Elisa Morgan, FullFill @fullfillmag
We’d love for you to follow along their amazing journey — and that’s why we created ONE Week, a series of emails, blog posts and actions to keep you updated and involved with the moms’ activities on the ground. Sign up to receive their daily updates on our ONE Moms page now: http://www.one.org/us/actnow/moms/.
By signing up for our updates, over the next few weeks you will receive their daily trip agenda, have an opportunity to hear from a ONE expert on key issues the moms will be learning about and much more. The bloggers will be chronicling the trip on their own blogs and the ONE Blog, too — so keep an eye out for their photos, interviews and stories in the coming days.
Although the moms have not left for Kenya yet, they’re online and ready to take your questions or hear from you right now. Use the hashtag #ONEmoms and direct a tweet to a ONE mom blogger from the list above. And don’t forget to follow along while they’re in Kenya, too.
Together we can shine a spotlight on the successes and challenges that accompany the fight to end extreme poverty and preventable disease around the world. Use your voice on behalf of the world’s poorest and be part of ONE Week. It only takes ONE mom.
Philip Bergin, a research scientist at the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, talks about how we can make a world without AIDS a reality.
Five years ago, I dedicated my professional life to advancing the research and development of an AIDS vaccine when I began working at the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative’s (IAVI) Human Immunology Laboratory in London. No virus has ever posed a greater scientific challenge to mankind than HIV, and we must solve the puzzle because an effective AIDS vaccine remains our best hope to end this devastating pandemic that has claimed and affected millions of lives.
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