19.10.04 - 11:48

One of my recent projects was to assist in a polio vaccination campaign, funded and organized by UNICEF. This campaign was quite different from the measles vaccination with which I worked in spring, mostly in that it was only 4 days long and went door-to-door.

My partner was a nursing student named Aicha. She did a valiant job, depite being extremely pregnant. However, oddly enough, it was I, the girl with no practical nursing experience, who told her what to do. "No, I am positive that we vaccinate all children under the age of five, even if they've been previously vaccinated." "No, that child has only two teeth. He is not over one year old." "Did you remember to ask if anyone under the age of fifteen has a limp?" (This was a difficult one; Moors will not admit to anyone in their family bein sick. When asked, they give the non-answer of 'God forbid!' Illnesses are hidden. This will be another stumbling block in my AIDS projects.)

We vaccinated hundreds of screaming children. The vaccine comes in the form of oral drops - each child must SWALLOW (not spit back into Aicha's face) two of them. Aicha gave the drops; we were in an area of Kankossa called Limgueta a little off the beaten path, so many of the kids were scared by The White Woman. Actually, when a child was being particularly uncooperative, Aicha threatened that The White Woman would give them a shot, if they didn't behave. Thanks for furthering cross-cultural understanding, Aicha.

The first two days, Aicha and I worked morning and night in Limgueta, which is within walking distance from the hospital. The third day, we went out en brousse. I arrived at the hospital at 8am, but had to wait until 11am for the car. Typical disorganization. Then three teams of women, including my team, were placed in Kelibele, a little brousse village.

Why three, for such a small population? Because Ali, an especially pompous, recalcitrant, misogynist, xenophobic man with a Napoleon complex (he's not short, but one feels he is intimately lacking), decided that certain villages were too tough for us fragile women. None of the women agreed, but listened to him anyway. That's culture...

And a whole 'nother issue. Ali is actually a teacher (who has ONE HOUR of gym class a week, but gets paid full salary) with whom I have a standing argument about using soap. Ali tells me that real Africans don't use soap, that they are immune to microbes, that it is God who determines when one is sick and when one dies. To this, I respond, healthy Africans use soap (and so do rich Americans), didn't your children just have diarrhea? bet you have it too, and why vaccinate if God chooses one's sicknesses and death? According to Annika, who has, in my opinion, the misfortune of being his "daughter," Ali will use soap for a couple of days after he talks to me. Then he goes back to plain old water and lets his kids have diarrhea two feet away from where the family is eating.

But I digress.

The upshot of Ali's interfering was that there was a lot of time wasted, as we finished vaccinating Kelibele an hour before the truck came back. The same happened at the next village of Hilshayb. The final trip to Agamamine 2 was excruciating: I sat in the back of the pick-up truck on an accumulation of burrs. My behind literally bled.

That night, we got home at 10pm. None of us had eaten since before 8am. Once again, great organization!

The fourth day, I went with two doctors to check out a girl in Limgueta who could no longer walk. Her name is Moileh and she is two years old. She is completely physically and emotionally unresponsive; she just lies there. She had been fine and healthy until a bout of neurological malaria. This led to several seizures. Now, despite treatment in Kankossa, Kiffa, and Nouakchott, she is permanently brain damaged. She will never walk or talk again. I've seen other kids with these problems, but it never gets easier. You hold them, speak to them, stroke them, but know that they will never be well again.

Maybe, at least, we can work toward protecting these poor little babies from polio. (Yes, I know I'm being sappy and emotional. But you should see their sweet faces!)

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