By Markus Faigle | Volunteer Project Director
These pictures mark a very happy occasion: the first baby born in our maternity clinic in Fiadanana!
Everybody in her village has been congratulating the young mother that she was able to give birth in a bed in one of the two brand new rooms we just built especially for mothers and their newborns.
Our Health Center is a CARMMA with a trained paramedic that also serves the role of a midwife. CARMMA stands for campaign for accelerated reduction of maternal mortality. There are currently 25 health facilities designated as CARMMA by the Ministry of Public Health of Madagascar.
We thought it was important to post these pictures now.
You supported our projects over the years, and you may tune in when you hear the word "Madagascar" in the news. With the current outbreak of the bubonic and pneumonic plague, Madagascar has made it into most major news outlets internationally in print or TV. Unfortunately every year there are plague outbreaks in Madagascar (yes, among many other health challenges plague is still one of them), but this year it came earlier and spread much faster.
Despite its stigma as "Black Death", plague is curable in the 21st century. A week’s worth of common antibiotics is all it takes, if diagnosed early and available in a timely manner. This makes plague distinctly different from Ebola or bird flu outbreaks that make the news, too. But, “All you need is quick and reliable access to antibiotics” does not make headlines that sell…
While our villages are thankfully not affected, Zahana is involved. Zahana's founder Dr. Ihanta is currently the director of health for the country. She is part of the plague crisis unit implementing a response. We are in constant contact with her, so Zahana is right in the middle of it, indeed. We hope that all the international attention and huge influx of experts can help curb this current 2016 plague outbreak.
For fact-based information we recommend the WHO external situation report from October 17.
Thank you for your support of our reforestation efforts.
Markus
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