Médicos sin fronteras

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I couldn't help thinking that it wasn't fair...
Date Published: 01/08/2005

Janet Raymond in Chad © Janet Raymond

I was working in a refugee camp near the Sudanese border. MSF is providing medical care to people who have fled from the brutal conflict in the Darfur region of Sudan. Some of them have been living in the refugee camps since 2003, but it is still too dangerous for them to go home. Farchana camp, where I was based, is now home to about 17,000 refugees, many of whom had to flee their homes with absolutely nothing. MSF is running a health centre, taking care of malnourished children and has built facilities to provide clean water and good sanitation.

I was dealing with a lot of complicated deliveries. Sadly, many people came to the clinic too late for us to be able to help them. Some women would go through three or even four days of labour before coming to the health centre and unfortunately I had to deliver quite a lot of stillborn babies.

I particularly remember a woman called Ache, a traditional midwife who I worked closely with. She was herself a refugee from Sudan. When she was eight months pregnant, she suddenly developed Hepatitis E. Within a few hours she became unconscious, and within a few days she had aborted the stillborn baby and died.

It was very upsetting for me as I couldn't help thinking that this just wasn't fair. Despite doing all we could, had she been in a country with better access to immediate healthcare and the medical technology that we are so familiar with in the UK, she would most likely have survived.

I still find it difficult to deal with the global inequality in access to good health care and the fact that people are dying of diseases and medical problems that would never occur in the UK. Ache died away from her own homeland, leaving behind four children. She was an excellent, highly skilled midwife, desperately needed within her own community.

Mother and Baby © Janet Raymond / MSF



Patients in MSF Clinic © Janet Raymond / MSF