WE ARE BUILDING A NEW MATERNITY HOSPITAL IN UGANDA: No Baby Left Behind!
OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA, OCTOBER 12th, 2020—— Imagine that you just delivered your newborn baby and your baby was slightly struggling to transition to life outside the womb, but you happened to be in a place that did not have the equipment to keep your baby alive. As a labor and delivery nurse trained in the United States, I was in utter disbelief the first time I witnessed a baby’s life slip away while volunteering in Uganda when it was such a simple device that could have easily saved that baby’s life.
As a person who grew up in a place where health access is readily available, you don’t usually spend much time or effort thinking about what if you didn’t have that access or what you did to deserve it. You don’t think about the people who lose their lives simply because of where by chance they were born. I wasn’t fully motivated or inspired to change this until I witnessed precious babies come and go into this world, and when I was the one in need of life saving treatment and it was no where around me.
It happened when I was in a small village of Kyegegwa far away from advanced medicine, equipment to diagnose my internal bleeding, or a sterile operating room to perform surgery on me. I remember getting into the one ambulance in the region that took me to the best hospital in the country and the ride was probably about 5 hours long. I paid $54 for this life saving ride which was amazingly cheap to me, but then I remembered the baby that I had just witnessed die because her family could not afford that same ambulance ride that I had the privilege to take. How long do we sit in our privilege and say oh that’s too bad before we are moved to do something?
Fast forward to today, a few of my fellow healthcare practitioners both in the US and on the ground in Uganda have decided to do something about this injustice. We partnered with a reputable local NGO which is also a registered 501c3 organization in the USA to build a Maternity Center.
Our hope is that this maternity center will be the first step to offer a place of hope. A place to have support through the labor process, access to medications and treatments that mothers might not be able to afford, and a place with developing equipment that can sustain life for newborns entering the world. Frankly, I never want to witness another baby die just because they didn’t have a piece of equipment that I could have paid for by giving up my daily cup of Starbucks. This hospital will be designed and built to meet the needs of expectant mothers in rural Uganda in a way that’s cost-effective, sustainable in-hospital services.
While the problems of this world are overwhelming, we are accepting the challenge and taking the plunge to do something about it by building a maternity hospital. We invite you to partner with us on this journey. Partner with us to create something that will give life and value to people who are often under appreciated, under valued, and under cared for.
When I was unconscious and in need of help, the people of Kyegegwa carried me to the ambulance. They gave me blankets and brought me food and water. I hope that with this maternity hospital, they will be treated with the same value and kindness that they showed me and that they will know that regardless of income or where they are from that they are valuable and deserving of adequate health access.
BY NATALIE LOWE
Labor and Delivery Registered Nurse, Kaiser Permanente
(R.N, B.S.N., P.H.N, B.S.)