By ABIGAEL SUM
Nairobi,Kenya:Her symbolic nomi-nation is to highlight the important role midwives play
In Africa, women die as a result of complications during pregnancy and childbirth because there are not enough midwives available to take care of them.
More than 80 per cent of these deaths could be taken care of in facilities with basic emergency obstetric care services.
Midwives are equipped with skills intended to prevent any complications that may occur in pregnancy, labour, delivery and post-partum, hence avoiding the risk of maternal deaths.
It is for this reason that African Medical and Research Foundation (Amref) is calling for the nomination of Esther Madudu, a Ugandan midwife, for the Nobel Peace Prize 2015.
Her symbolic nomination is to highlight the important role midwives play in saving lives of mothers and their children in Africa.
Esther is an Amref-trained midwife employed by the Government of Uganda.
Her passion for midwifery grew after she watched her grandmother, who was a traditional birth attendant, deliver a mother. She is also a victim after her child died during birth because the only midwife in that facility was attending to another patient.
She resolved to ensure that no mother would have to go through what she did because there was no one to resuscitate her baby while she lay there gasping for breath.
Madudu has worked as a midwife for almost 12 years in a very remote health facility in Soroti, Eastern Uganda. She has had to endure the challenges of working as a midwife in rural areas where there is no water and power.
“Sometimes I am forced to use light from my mobile phone to deliver babies when the solar panels and torches do not work,” she said.
She delivers 45 to 50 babies every month in addition to giving prenatal services, among them examination of the mothers, counselling of HIV-positive mothers, nutritional education, and teaching mothers how to prevent transmission of HIV to their children.
Madudu notes that the workload of a midwife is heavy, but then she says she has no choice but to save the lives of both mother and child.
“Midwives are a neglected lot as people tend to prefer traditional birth attendants rather than walking to a health facility and be examined by midwives,” she said.
SENSITISE PEOPLE
Midwives, she said, are unique as they can do more than the traditional birth attendants, nurses and doctors and therefore the need to sensitise people on their role and train more midwives to reduce maternal deaths.
The 32-year-old has toured several countries in Europe advocating for midwifery recognition and spurred a lot of public, government and media attention.
She is the face of the Stand Up for African Mothers campaign launched by Amref, which runs until 2015. The campaign seeks to draw attention to the plight of African mothers and mobilise citizens worldwide to ensure mothers get the basic medical care during pregnancy and childbirth.
Madudu reiterates that as we celebrate the International Day of the Midwife, midwives should be absorbed into the health care system because without a skilled midwife, anything can happen. She adds even as the Kenyan Government plans to deliver free maternity services, it should increase the number of midwives in health facilities.
“For as long as I have been in midwifery, I have been championing the fight against maternal and child mortality. My job goes beyond deliveries. It is about getting the proper information and services to those that need it most, and advocating for maternal health to be prioritised. We are all alive today because someone gave birth to us. How can we not make that a priority in health care,” she poses.
