Maternal and neo-natal health

Giving birth can be a traumatic experience, especially for first time mothers and fathers. Nepal has some of the worst infant mortality figures in the world, sixteen times higher than the UK. At present Nepal doesn’t have any government funded healthcare.

However, Green Tara is working with the Nepalese government to offer pre and post natal care to expectant mothers. Nawang was one of the first people to benefit from Green Tara community health centres. She lives in rural Nepal and was put off going to hospital because she had heard that health workers were cruel to women. Her mother-in-law had given birth to all her children at home without any problems; she had offered to help deliver Nawang’s baby.

When Nawang went into labour she suffered from severe, unnatural pains. She was persuaded by her husband to go the community hospital run by Green Tara. Thanks to the skilled nurse the complications were treated and she was able to deliver a healthy baby boy, she left hospital the next day.

But what would have happened to Nawang if she was one of the nine out of ten women in rural Nepal who don’t have access to a skilled medical professional?

Green Tara is working with the Nepalese government to develop an education programme for rural communities to dispel some of the rumours about health care (like the ones that Nawang was told). Green Tara is promoting the use of sterilized equipment both in the home and in hospital because it will dramatically reduce the chances of women developing complication and infections. The project has developed and now distributes thousands of home delivery kits so that women who choose to have homebirths have sterilized equipment to use as they go through the magical, if slightly scary experience of child birth.

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