Convoy to Cape Town
Keir Philip writes on the ’Convoy to Cape Town’, a major event raising awareness of maternal health in South Africa.
On the dusty floor of Cato Manor township near Durban, the air pulsating with the collaborative efforts of South African and British musicians from the White Ribbon Alliance ‘Convoy To Cape Town’, I sat surrounded by 15 children from the local orphanage and asked them ‘Why can pregnancy and giving birth be dangerous?’
I already knew the issues; I’d read them in a book. 80% of maternal deaths result from direct obstetric complications including haemorrhage (bleeding), infection, unsafe abortion, hypertensive disorders and obstructed labour. The children knew the issues; their mothers had died because of them. And I already knew the statistics; I had read them in a report. One woman dies every minute of everyday from pregnancy related causes. The children knew the life those statistics described. In one of those minutes, on one of those days, that dying woman was their mother. As soon as my friend MC Black Moss had translated to Zulu, pens hit paper. The responses became images, which in turn became banners. By circumventing language barriers through the universal language of art, each child’s voice was given a chance to be heard, ‘People can’t afford to travel to hospital’, ‘men are beating women’, ‘some women don’t have a break from work around birth’. And, unsurprisingly, ‘the virus is killing mothers’, as HIV/AIDS is the leading cause of maternal mortality in South Africa. Through raising awareness of the situation for women, which was the intention of the convoy, politicians can be made accountable and forced to make the changes that women are entitled to. This should be seen as a fundamental step in tackling these issues in an effective and sustainable manner.
In global terms the situation is this: Every minute of every day, 380 women become pregnant; 190 women face unplanned or unwanted pregnancies; 110 women experience pregnancy related complications; 40 women have unsafe abortions; and one woman dies. Furthermore for every woman who dies up to 50 women suffer from significant morbidities (http://www.safemotherhood.org/). The majority of the deaths and disabilities that result from pregnancy related causes are avoidable, through highly efficient, cost effective methods such as facilitating clean and safe delivery; providing essential obstetric and antenatal care; and providing adequate family planning services. However, implementation requires political will and appropriate, policy level prioritisation of maternal care.
The White Ribbon Alliance’s ‘Convoy to Cape Town’ was a musical convoy across South Africa of musicians and dancers, ending in Cape Town for the Global Economic Forum. It involved UK artists Get Cape Wear Cape Fly, Man Like Me, Wunmi, Tawiah, Micachu, Sam Isaac, Mc Bonzai, Mc Kelz, and myself Kid Keir (a dancer and UK medical student), as well as South African artists including Spitmunky, Josie Field, and many other musicians and dancers along the way. The convoy put on both community and night club events in which all the artist’s talents where unleashed, resulting in some truly amazing events. Banners that were made as part of these events, by the people who attended them, are now being displayed at events throughout the UK with Glastonbury festival being their first. The banners allow the children to put across their views and stories directly to everyone attending the events and enjoys media coverage. If my mother died of AIDS, infected because she didn’t have the power to object to unprotected sex, I would want people to know and call for the situation to be addressed, as did one 12-year-old boy that MC Bonzai spoke to in Johannesburg.
Despite the agreement of all of the world’s countries and leading development institutions on Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 5, to improve maternal health, no significant changes have been observed in maternal mortality in the last 20 years. The MDG target is to reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality ratio by 2015 in comparison to 1990, as well achieving universal access to reproductive health. For much of the world, these targets could be achieved through simple, cost-effective interventions. However, the 2015 targets are a far cry from the present situation. Action and appropriate prioritisation is long overdue; politicians and policy makers must be held accountable for reaching the targets they agreed upon.
Today we live in world controlled by the media. So, through media coverage, as well as public awareness, the ‘Convoy to Cape Town’ increased pressure on the politicians who are able to make the necessary changes. Why should we expect politicians to sufficiently prioritise issues such as those relating to safe motherhood, when people are simply unaware of the present situation? The ‘Convoy To Cape Town’ aimed to attract media coverage though art, music and dance to bridge language barriers, and because there is a need to ‘make a song and dance about it’.
Possibly the worst aspect of the situation for mothers at present, is that viable methods of preventing much of the maternal health-related health burden exist, but are not being adequately implemented. As members, or future members of the healthcare profession, you have the potential to make significant contributions towards ending this injustice. The White Ribbon Alliance (WRA) is an International coalition of NGOs, individuals, faith organisations, UN agencies, policy makers, and others. It allows members to speak with a unified voice when calling for appropriate level prioritisation of maternal health by policy makers. The WRA is not a charity aiming to raise funds to provide short-term relief, rather a coalition of individuals and organisations promoting increased awareness about making pregnancy and childbirth safe for mothers and newborns throughout the world. The WRA for Safe Motherhood campaigns for greater advocacy, awareness and accountability to ensure sustainable improvement globally, which in this case took the form of the ‘Convoy to Cape Town’. All the members of the WRA contribute in their own particular way. Everyone has their own specific abilities and attributes that they can use to help address the issues relating to safe motherhood. Joining the WRA is free at http://www.whiteribbonalliance.org/ and simply by becoming more aware of the issues facing many of the world’s women, you will be able to pass on this information and contribute to improving the situation for women throughout the world.
The mothers of today make the humanity of the future. The importance of maternal health cannot be overstated. Safe motherhood is not only of significance for women of childbearing age, but also for society as a whole. It is therefore the responsibility of all of us to ensure that this situation is addressed.
Keir Elmslie James Philip, 3rd Year Medical Student (International Health BSc) at the University of Sheffield, UKmda05kep@shef.ac.uk