Taxi Interventions

On Thursday Marion, Irvin, and myself took a taxi to Kabwe. In the taxi with us was an elderly man and obviously the driver. Of course being two white women in Kapiri they assume we are medical professionals and we get to talking. I was shocked at the information they gave us.

The taxi driver was very inquisitive. He told us that the reason why a baby dies at childbirth is because the father is cheating on the mother. He believed in this adamantly. The elderly man was also in agreement. Of course I had to ask them if they knew of any men who had their babies die and they weren’t cheating on the mother, and they both said yes! I then brought up the obvious point of how does one affect the other as didn’t they see that babies died for other reasons? And they explained that there is a counsel of women that will decide if the man is cheating on the woman, and whatever THEY decide will say if the man is cheating or not. I am sure hoping some part of this was lost in translation, because I just can’t believe what I’m hearing.

They both were quite helpful though in giving us some thoughts about how to bring more women to the clinics to deliver. Guess what they suggested? Transportation and supplying the items that they are told to bring at the time of delivery. They also suggested having talks in the village, and stressed the importance of making sure that we also formed men’s groups as well. Good thoughts, I never would have thought that is was important to include the men right away in these kind of discussions in communities. But it’s promising to hear that men want to be included.