We left Johannesburg a day earlier than planned at the request of Kwame from Franklyn Lane Films. He was already in Swaziland by now and eager to start filming some of my Flight For Every Mother activities.
At Lanseria Airport we met Nomkhosi Dlamini, recently sponsored educationally by the Girl Child Education Fund and now trying to continue tertiary studies in South Africa. We had offered that one of the sponsored girls should fly with us from Johannesburg to Swaziland and to say Nomkhosi was excited was an understatement!
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Leaving Lanseria was straightforward and the fees much more affordable than I had anticipated! As Lanseria is to the North of the city of Johannesburg, we didn’t see much of it from the air and we were soon flying East over farmland. It was Nomkhosi’s first ever flight, and I think she was a little unsettled by the turbulence, felt of course more easily in a small aircraft than a larger one. She soon fell asleep!
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Ross and I were busy plotting our approach to Matsapha International Airport. Kwame would be there to film our landing. We decided to do three landings to maximise his chances of some good shots!
I did the first two and then Ross did the third.
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We had managed to spot Kwame on the first landing and so were able to land closer to him along the runway on the subsequent landings. There was one other Cessna in the Circuit around the airfield, and we later found out that that had caused some confusion within the welcome party!
The only other aeroplane on the apron was the King’s jet! As we gathered our baggage and headed to the terminal we were met by Mr Muzi Dlamini of the Swaziland Wellness Centre and the President of the Nurse’s Association, shortly followed by our friends (with the cameras rolling) from Franklyn Lane, and the Deputy Minister of Health. I had had the heads up that this visit would be very full and formal and now I could see that that would be the case! How wonderful! We started our introductions in the VIP lounge of the airport and from there drove the short distance to the Ministry of Health in Manzini:
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The Minister of Health was new and had been in the role for the past 3 days only but nevertheless spoke very eloquently about the link between the education of girls and their future reproductive health. Female sexual reproductive health was a government priority. She quoted some frightening statistics about sexual violence – 33% of women in Swaziland have been exposed to sexual violence by the age of 18 – and about teenage pregnancy – 56% of women have been pregnant at least once by the age of 20.
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Over lunch we discussed my itinerary for the next 4 days. I would visit hospitals and clinics at all levels, a school and run a breakfast training session, in addition to social engagements and a end-of-visit debrief on Tuesday morning with the Minister prior to departure.
And so to our first stop – Raleigh Fitkin Memorial Hospital. It was a regional referral hospital, funded by the Nazarene Church in conjunction with the government and the staff were waiting to greet us:
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We sat down in the boardroom for a discussion about the hospital, its goals and its challenges. By now I was getting tired and it was somewhat difficult to stay awake through all the formalities! I would get used to such meetings by the end of my visit to Swaziland! Interestingly both the Obstetrician and the Paediatrician were Ethiopian in origin.
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A hospital tour followed. The outpatient clinics were a tight squeeze without any patients present (by now it was late afternoon and the clinics had finished) so I could only imagine how busy it must get in the mornings!
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Two common threads of discussion from staff were the shortage of professionals with a high patient load, and the impact of HIV. Forty-one percent of maternal deaths were from AIDS-related opportunistic infections such as unusual pneumonias, meningitis and TB – a higher contributor than in just about every other country in the world.
Labour ward was not too busy, although they had just had a baby! In all there were 7 beds for 8000-8500 deliveries per year.
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The recent introduction of a asphyxia prevention protocol had reduced admissions to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit from 45% to 20%. Their were 27 beds for sick and premature babies and these were the only such beds in the whole of Swaziland.
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‘No woman or baby should die.’
We had a quick debrief and vote of thanks:
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And we were off to our evening reception at the paramedic headquarters. Phew I was tired and there were still more people to talk to and speeches to hear! Oh – and my interview with Kwame went on into the early hours!