Is africa a comedy or a tragedy? The answer of course is that it is both at the same time. Today I have been helping at an outreach clinic (as i am not really supposed to be doing a doctors work because the lady doing my authorisation in lusaka has for some reason not been into work the last few days!)
At both village locations I caused great delight. My attempts at saying' very well thankyou' to their zambian 'how are you' - were met with uproarious laughter - followed by a song of welcome. The children all wanted to touch my skin to see if the colour would come off. Smiles all round. The ability of people to take pleasure in small things here is humbling.
But then we came to weigh and record the children's weights, and a worrying pattern emerges. The babies are all breast fed and put on weight very well for the first year or so. After that typically, weight gain is very slow indeed or non existent so that a child who has been of average weight aged 1 is down around the bottom 3% by age 4. Very often one can see why - as beside the 2 or 3 yr old child is a mum with a new baby on her back.
So - what is happening with contraception - and what do people want? - i don't really know except that the morning after pill is not available at the clinic - nothing official it is just O/S out of stock.
What is clear is that the rapidly growing population puts huge strains on the demand for everything - but jobs in particular. I am sure that i will be seeing the consequences for peoples everyday lives in stark reality in the clinic in the next few days.
At both village locations I caused great delight. My attempts at saying' very well thankyou' to their zambian 'how are you' - were met with uproarious laughter - followed by a song of welcome. The children all wanted to touch my skin to see if the colour would come off. Smiles all round. The ability of people to take pleasure in small things here is humbling.
But then we came to weigh and record the children's weights, and a worrying pattern emerges. The babies are all breast fed and put on weight very well for the first year or so. After that typically, weight gain is very slow indeed or non existent so that a child who has been of average weight aged 1 is down around the bottom 3% by age 4. Very often one can see why - as beside the 2 or 3 yr old child is a mum with a new baby on her back.
So - what is happening with contraception - and what do people want? - i don't really know except that the morning after pill is not available at the clinic - nothing official it is just O/S out of stock.
What is clear is that the rapidly growing population puts huge strains on the demand for everything - but jobs in particular. I am sure that i will be seeing the consequences for peoples everyday lives in stark reality in the clinic in the next few days.
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