hi there, what a very moving story! says everything there is to human grit, spirit of service AND a great statement on the writer's profound and beautiful perception. may the tribe grow.ciao.
>From: "Aman Malik" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Reply-To: [email protected] >To: [email protected] >Subject: [ZESTGlobal] The Illiterate Surgeon >Date: Mon, 13 Jun 2005 15:51:42 -0000 > > > > The Illiterate Surgeon > > By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF > The New York Times | June 12, 2005 > http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/12/opinion/12kristof.html?hp > >ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia > >Just about the worst thing that can happen to a teenage girl in this >world is to develop an obstetric fistula that leaves her trickling >bodily wastes, stinking and shunned by everyone around her. That >happened four decades ago to Mamitu Gashe. >Skip to next paragraph >The Illiterate Surgeon >More Columns by Nicholas D. Kristof > >But the most amazing thing about Ms. Mamitu is not what she endured >but what she has become. > >Ms. Mamitu's story begins when she was an illiterate 15-year-old in a >remote Ethiopian village unreachable by road and with no doctor >nearby. She married a local man, became pregnant and after three days >of labor, she lapsed into unconsciousness and the baby was stillborn. > >"After I woke up, the bed was wet" with urine, she remembers. "I >thought I would get better after two or three days, but I didn't." > >That's typically how an obstetric fistula arises: a teenage girl, >often malnourished and with an immature pelvis, tries to deliver her >first baby. The fetus gets stuck, and after several days of labor it >is stillborn - but some of the mother's internal tissues have been >damaged in that time, and so to her horror she finds herself >constantly trickling urine or sometimes feces from her vagina. > >Soon she stinks. Her husband normally abandons her, the constant >trickle of urine leaves her with terrible sores on her legs, and if >she survives at all she is told to build a hut away from the rest of >the village and to stay away from the village well. Some girls die of >infections or suicide, but many linger for decades as pariahs and >hermits - their lives effectively over at the age of about 15. > >Fistulas were common in America in the 19th century. But improved >medical care means that they are now almost unknown in the West, while >the United Nations has estimated that at least two million girls and >women live with fistulas in the developing world, mostly in Africa. > >This should be an international scandal, because a $300 operation can >normally repair the injury. A major effort to improve maternal health >in the developing world should be a no-brainer, for it could prevent >most fistulas and reduce deaths in childbirth by half within a decade, >saving 300,000 lives a year. > >But maternal health is woefully neglected, and those suffering >fistulas are completely voiceless - young, female, poor, rural and >ostracized. They are the 21st century's lepers. > >Ms. Mamitu was exceptionally lucky in that she was brought to a >hospital here in Addis Ababa that offered free surgery by a saintly >husband and wife pair of gynecologists from Australia, Reginald and >Catherine Hamlin. Reg is now dead, while Catherine is the Mother >Teresa of our time and is long overdue for a Nobel Peace Prize. > >After that operation, 42 years ago, Ms. Mamitu was given a job making >beds in the hospital. Then she began helping out during surgeries, and >after a couple of years of watching she was asked by Dr. Reg Hamlin to >cut some stitches. Eventually, Ms. Mamitu was routinely performing the >entire fistula repair herself. > >Over the decades, Ms. Mamitu has gradually become one of the world's >most experienced fistula surgeons. Gynecologists from around the world >go to the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital to train in fistula repair, and >typically their teacher is Ms. Mamitu. > >Not bad for an illiterate Ethiopian peasant who as a child never went >to a day of school. > >A few years ago, Ms. Mamitu tired of being an illiterate master >surgeon, and so she began night school. She's now in the third grade. > >The Fistula Hospital where Ms. Mamitu works is nicknamed "puddle city" >- because patients stroll around dripping urine - but it abounds with >joy and hope. > >President Bush has increased aid to the developing world generally and >to Africa in particular, but a few days ago he rejected Tony Blair's >appeal for a further dramatic increase in assistance for Africa. The >real stakes in that rejection will be measured in lives like Ms. >Mamitu's. I hope that Mr. Bush will reconsider - for the sake of >people like those girls with fistula living in huts alone on the edges >of hundreds of thousands of villages. > >Ms. Mamitu shows us what a tragedy it would be to write them off. A >couple of Australians once gave Ms. Mamitu a break, and so today Ms. >Mamitu is not a victim at all, but an inspiration. > >And, I hope, an inspiration to us to be more generous. > >E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > _________________________________________________________________ Think Rani is the best? http://server1.msn.co.in/sp05/iifa/ Make sure she wins the award. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> In low income neighborhoods, 84% do not own computers. At Network for Good, help bridge the Digital Divide! http://us.click.yahoo.com/S.QlOD/3MnJAA/Zx0JAA/uTGrlB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> -- This is ZESTGlobal. 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