introduction
Initially formed as a response to the BBC Panorama programme Dead Mums Don’t Cry, Hope for Grace Kodindo is dedicated to making birth safer for the mothers and babies of the Hôpital Général de Référence in N’Djamena, in the Central African country of Chad, and supporting their dedicated team of midwives and obstetricians. However, due the success we've had there have been some major changes in recent months. Go to the bottom of the page to find out more, under the heading "Latest News On Or Success"
In Chad there's a saying: "A pregnant woman has one foot in the grave"
Please help us to change this
You can save a life right now!
In the West,
dying in childbirth is almost unheard of. After all, in the UK the maternal
mortality rate is around 1 in 5000.
In
Chad, 1 in 11 women die in pregnancy or childbirth.
In
the maternity unit of the Hôpital Général de Référence,
the main hospital in N’Djamena, Chad’s capital, there are 11,000 births
a year. The tireless work of their obstetric team means the women who
reach the hospital are the lucky ones. Yet facilities there reveal an
appalling lack of funding......
The
hospital's maternity unit cannot offer its patients oxygen or resuscitation
equipment. Supplies of surgical and infection prevention equipment are
practically non-existent. Life-saving drugs that cost mere pence in the
West are unavailable throughout the entire country. Even the drugs that
are available are often way beyond the means of the women who need them.
When your family has to survive on 50p a day, how can you afford £1
for antiseptic, £1.50 for a drip, or 25p for a sterile needle?
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In
this Chadian hospital alone, hundreds of women and babies a year have
been dying of pregnancy-related conditions, often for the want of
less than £5. Since Hope for Grace Kodindo started to
donate drugs and equipment, not a single woman has died of Pre-eclampsia. |
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Hope for Grace Kodindo’s aim is simply to give support to one hardworking and dedicated obstetric team in one hospital, and make birth as safe as possible for the 11,000 women a year who deliver their babies there. We source vital drugs and equipment at the lowest cost – donated if possible – and deliver them to the hospital, where they are provided free of charge to |
the women who cannot afford to pay for them. Every penny we receive is spent on sourcing and shipping these goods.
birth in chad
Giving birth in the West is a joyous event. A time of celebration, maybe a glass of champagne. Flowers are bought, expensive gifts are given. Nowadays it’s so safe that we barely even think to ask if mother and baby are doing well.
But what about birth in Chad? If you’re lucky, you’ll have trained care
during labour and delivery mothers have a trained birth–three-quarters
of mothers don’t. In rural areas, only 16 percent of assistant. If things
are straightforward you’ll receive competent care, but don’t expect such
luxuries as privacy or pain relief. If things aren’t so straightforward,
you’re in trouble.
The obstetricians and midwives know how to treat you, but they can’t give
you the medication you need because they don’t have it. The equipment
that could help deliver your baby safely is broken, or non-existent. You’ll
need your family. They will be given a shopping list and sent on a macabre
trolley dash around town, rounding up money, drugs, equipment and even
blood-donors in a race against time. The prize? Your life, and that of
your baby. Imagine having to watch helplessly while your wife, your sister,
your daughter or your baby dies, because you can’t raise £5, or
because the drug she needs is simply not available for any price.
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Now imagine you can step in to this horrific situation, and provide exactly what is needed. Well, you can. Donate here.
- In Chad, 40% of women have had at least one child, or are pregnant, by the age of just 17.
- There is one midwife to every 37,000 Chadians. Two-thirds of these are in the capital city, N’Djamena.
- A woman’s life expectancy in Chad is only 49 years..
latest news on our success
We are pleased to tell you that there have been some very exciting developments and items of news over the past few months.Firstly, we have received statistics from Dr Grace Kodindo related to the numbers of women (and their babies of course) who are alive and well because of our support. In 2005, in the 12months preceding the PANORAMA programme and the provision of Magnesium Sulphate and other resources, the maternal mortality was 14%, much worse than we had thought. In the year following our intervention, this figure dropped to 2.3%, which meets and exceeds the United Nations Millennium Development Goal. This figure covers the two maternity hospitals in N’Djamena, Chad’s capital. There is more good news in that the neonatal mortality rates for these periods were pre-intervention 33%, which dropped to 7.3%. These statistics are staggering and were communicated to the European Parliament on 13th May by Dr Grace Kodindo herself. The recipients of this news were suitably impressed, especially when they were told that this was not down to governments or large organisations, but a small group of people in the UK.
The second piece of news is that in 2007, we in HFGK were approached by a representative of the UNFPA (a wing of the United Nations), requesting that we consider extending our support to Liberia where the rate of maternal mortality is 1:8 and Sierra Leone where the rate is 1:7. Before any decision was made we asked Dr Kodindo whether she would be happy with us extending our support beyond Chad. We were not surprised to be told by Dr Grace that “I would be honoured for women’s lives to be saved in any country using money raised in my name.” Co-incidentally, Angela Gorman HFGK Chair was offered the opportunity to travel to Liberia in January with another charity to see the situation for herself and HFGK. Angela funded the visit herself and on return, recommended that the charity remit be extended to include Liberia, a country, which has only just emerged from a long civil war and has not, trained any doctors for 15yrs. The UNFPA Representative is understandably delighted that we are going to help Liberia. The charity’s work has come to the attention of the Welsh Assembly Government, who funded a further short visit in May for Angela to allow robust accountability arrangements for any future resources to be set up, plus funding for a midwife and neonatal colleague to begin the training for midwives, all of which was achieved. (Reports and photographs from the visits are available on this site.) We have been made aware that the Liberian President Mrs Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has been informed of our visits and intentions and wants to be kept informed via the Liberian Ambassador in London.
Finally, what we are achieving is only possible, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. I know that Dr Grace appreciates every single donation of money, time and equipment; in fact every gesture of goodwill from individuals and companies goes that much further in countries, which have little or nothing. It is only when one sees, as I did, a midwife scrubbing a pair of gloves for re-use that the stark reality of what we have to do hits home. For us, it is like looking up Everest, knowing that we have to climb it. Sounds impossible but with your help, it won’t stop us trying!