Securing the Pikin Dem

The Welbodi Partnership is pleased to introduce a guest blogger from the Freetown-based International Military Advisory and Training Team  (IMATT). Major G D Hogg of the UK Royal Marines has been volunteering his time over the last few months to help upgrade security at the compound shared by the Ola During Children’s Hospital and the neighboring Princess Christian Maternity Hospital.

With Major Hogg’s help, the hospitals have formed a joint security committee and have identified steps to ensure the safety of patients and staff and the security of equipment and supplies. These include training for the hospital security guards, delivered by IMATT’s own security team. Below is an account from Major Hogg from the first of these training sessions.

The Welbodi Partnership and our hospital partners are grateful to Major Hogg and to his IMATT security colleagues for all their time and effort in planning and executing this project.

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On Friday April 3, I arrived at the “Cottage” hospital compound housing the Ola During Children’s Hospital and Princess Christian Maternity Hospital with a team of very excited IMATT security officers for the first day of security training for the hospitals’ own security team. The aim of this first day was twofold: to instill a sense of pride and confidence among the hospitals’ security officers; and to introduce them to specific security tactics and procedures.

The day began with a morning of lectures delivered by locally employed IMATT Security Officers covering various topics such as public relations, crowd control, use of equipment, and patrolling techniques, followed by practical training in the afternoon around the hospital site.

It was clear from the outset that the guards were at a novice level regarding some of their procedures and tactics. However, this was overcome by a keen desire to learn and by limitless enthusiasm from all who took part.

This was highlighted during equipment training, which injected a bit of unexpected humor into the day. After receiving a demonstration on how to use hand-cuffs properly, all of the guards were given their own sets to practice with on each other and then keep for future use. After a flurry of activity in which everyone grabbed a set and put them on their respective “partners”, they all realized that the keys were mixed up in a pile at the bottom of the bag.

This all occurred at 11 a.m., at which time I decided to escape for a long lunch to return at 1p.m., when the final student was being “released”.

It was encouraging to see throughout the morning’s lectures and discussion that the guards were sensitive to the issues surrounding security at both hospitals such as the movement of staff at night, single females, and most importantly the patients. To that end, discussion was key when exploring scenarios and at every juncture a robust and workable solution was sought.

The afternoon involved a practical security patrol, where the guards were taken around the perimeter of the hospital site and issues and scenarios were discussed. Here, it was key that a solution to the problems presented, came from the guards themselves, and for most cases they presented intelligent and well thought out answers.

The next phase of the training will involve specific modules in vehicle searching, controlling entrance and exit points of the hospital site and night patrolling (to be conducted during night time hours at the hospital). The IMATT security guards thoroughly enjoyed the chance to stand up in front of a class of students and pass on their knowledge and experience and will be involved in all future training.

The day was a complete success. The guards reacted well to the training and instruction that they were given and showed animated enthusiasm for further training. The purchase of more equipment such as flashlights and night uniforms will be a catalyst to exploit further advances to those made so far.

The Ola During Children’s Hospital and Princess Christian Maternity Hospital Security Team

Welbodi on the road: London

Recently, Welbodi Partnership representatives traveled to the US and the UK to raise awareness about our work, recruit volunteers and supporters, and raise funds.

Here is a recent news article about an event we held at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London.

Many thanks to Welbodi friends and supporters Sarah Froome, Krystle Lai, and Yani Tyskerud for their help organizing this event, and to all of you who attended.

Would you like to help organize a Welbodi Partnership fundraising event in your hometown? Please contact us at info(at)welbodipartnership.org to find out how.

Salma Hayek and Sierra Leone

So it seems that Salma Hayek’s breast is all it takes to get pediatric health in Sierra Leone on the public’s radar.

We should have thought of that a long time ago.

In this ABC News piece, Salma first visits the Ola During Children’s Hospital, Sierra Leone’s only government children’s hospital, where the Welbodi Partnership works to help improve the standard of care provided to sick children. There she watches a week-old baby die a terribly painful (and utterly preventable) death from tetanus.

Tragically, this is not unusual. One in six children in Sierra Leone die in infancy. One in four die before their fifth birthday.

Salma then goes upcountry, to the provincial capital (misleadingly called “a remote corner of the country” by the ABC folks) of Makeni. Once there, she decides to breastfeed a tiny baby whose mother did not have milk to give.

This, of course, is what set the news media and blogosphere abuzz. Famous Hollywood actress gives breast to poor African child. History upended as light-skinned wet nurse feeds dark-skinned child. Bodily fluids shared on camera.

Breastfeeding is incredibly important to the health of young children, particularly in places like Sierra Leone, and is one of the best ways to ensure proper nutrition and protect against illness. And if Salma Hayek’s breast helps raise awareness of the importance of breastfeeding, so be it. (Though I can’t help but point out that Sierra Leoneans are much less abuzz about this than the rest of the world. The vast majority will never see this footage or the headlines that have accompanied it, and in any case have no idea who Salma Hayek is. At the hospital, we turned up the day after this film crew and were told only that some white people had visited the day before; none of the staff knew how famous she was.)

But the film’s focus on breastfeeding and on other preventive measures – specifically a vaccine to prevent tetanus – ignores another reality, one evident in the first few minutes of the piece when Salma watches that tiny baby die in what should be Sierra Leone’s premier pediatric care facility.

The Ola During Children’s Hospital should be in a position to provide accessible, high-quality care to sick children. Parents should come to the hospital early, as soon as their children get sick. Drugs and supplies – at least for the most common illnesses – should be available and free of charge. Nurses and doctors should be properly motivated and trained, and should have the medical tools and enabling environment they need to provide care.

In reality, however, the dedicated staff of the children’s hospital struggle to provide even a basic standard of care. The hospital has no x-ray, rudimentary laboratory facilities, and no back-up power supply. Doctors and nurses are forced to charge impoverished and severely ill patients fees for consultations, laboratory tests, and drugs and supplies in order both to provide the hospital with revenue to meet its running costs, and to supplement their own meager salaries. (A trained and experienced nurse makes less than $50 per month, not nearly enough to feed a family).

These fees mean that many parents wait far too long before they seek medical care for their children, and that too often they cannot afford urgently-needed medical interventions – medicine to treat malaria or pneumonia, a blood transfusion for a severely anemic child, fluids to treat dehydration in a baby with diarrhea. These delays cost the lives of hundreds if not thousands of children each year.

Prevention of childhood illness is absolutely essential, and UNICEF is right to invest in vaccines and the promotion of exclusive breastfeeding.

But even with the best prevention, many children will still get sick. If there is not a pediatric health system capable of providing effective, low-cost treatment for the most common illnesses, the country will continue to lose far too many young lives.

The Welbodi Partnership supports pediatric health care in Sierra Leone by partnering with the Ministry of Health and Sanitation and the Ola During Children’s Hospital. To learn more and to find out how you can help, please visit our website.

Welcome

Currently, more than one in four Sierra Leonean children die before their fifth birthday, mainly to preventable and treatable illnesses such as pneumonia, diarrhoea and malaria. The Welbodi Partnership aims to give these children a better chance.

We have been working with the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, the Ola During Children's Hospital, and international partners to create the Sierra Leone Institute of Child Health (SLICH). In doing so we have built a unique combination of local presence and international partnerships to support improvements in child mortality and morbidity.

We'll be updating this blog with stories about the staff and patients at ODCH and news about events and fundraising.