As our neighbours continue to struggle to regain some sort
of normal life in Haiti, good Samaritans from the Cayman Islands continue to
offer aid and hope.
The Caymanian Compass is dedicated to letting our readers
know about the people and groups that travel from Cayman to Haiti. Some of the
missions are quite public and we know that there are and have been others that
are quite private.
Today we have kudos to Mairead Campbell and Sue Doak who
spent their vacation time in Haiti teaching midwives how to safely deliver
babies.
While there they battled unsanitary facilities, horrific
conditions, a lack of basic equipment and meds as well as long held
superstitions.
The two women joined up with the American organisation
Midwives for Haiti, which was set up in 2006 with the aim of teaching Haitian
women who are already nurses or nurse assistants to become midwives to help
reduce the high maternal and neonatal mortality and morbidity rates.
The statistics are alarming: six in every 100 infants born
in Haiti don’t live to see their first birthday. Most women give birth at home
and 76 per cent of deliveries are carried out by unskilled helpers.
One in 17 women die from childbirth complications.
While the need for midwives has always been evident in
Haiti, the conditions that Haitians face on a daily basis have been worse since
a massive earthquake struck the country on 12 January, 2010, killing more than
200,000 people and displacing around 1.5 million people.
There are many groups from the Cayman Islands and around the
globe that are still trekking to Haiti to help the country grow out of that
disaster, but the process is slow.
There is a fear that businessmen and donors are going to go
elsewhere if Haiti isn’t seen to be making its best efforts to curb corruption,
bring in the rule of the law and be democratic.
But people like Mairead, Sue and others in the Cayman
Islands will continue to do what they can to help the Haitian people improve
their lots in life. To all of you, we say thanks.
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