A harrowing escape births a wonderful surprise
5'
Nzia Mowavinga will never forget the day the rebels came to her village.
She was nine months pregnant at the time.
What is usually a time filled with expectation and excitement for a new mother was instead a time of enormous uncertainty for Nzia. In fact, living in a conflict area means a life constantly filled with uncertainties: Is my family safe? When will we eat again? When can we return home?
Nzia lives in Ituri Province in the troubled eastern region of the DR Congo. Here and in neighbouring North Kivu, fighting amongst numerous rebel groups forces thousands of people to flee their homes, sometimes multiple times. With nowhere else to go, many hide in the jungle or walk for days on the roads until they reach safety.
The Medair-supported health clinic where Nzia received free antenatal consultations and had planned to give birth was burned down in the attack. She didn’t know what she would do. She had no way to pay for the health care bills she knew giving birth at other facilities would incur. She didn’t even have a blanket in which to wrap her newborn baby.
Luckily for Nzia, Medair has set up a transfer service to ensure pregnant women with complications can be safely transferred from Medair-supported clinics, some as far as 80 km away, to Komanda Hospital, the only hospital in the area equipped to handle complicated births. Prior to the transfer service, clinics had no choice but to send pregnant women to hospital on the back of a motorbike, often in the middle of the night.
For Nzia, the transfer system may have saved her life. Worried for the health of her unborn baby after fleeing her home, Nzia visited the Medair-supported health clinic in another village and asked to see a midwife. The health centre staff immediately referred Nzia to Komanda Hospital. There, Nzia gave birth in a safe and clean maternity clinic to not just one, but two healthy babies! “I didn’t know I was expecting twins!” she says, smiling.
Medair covered the cost of Nzia’s transfer to Komanda Hospital and the birth of her beautiful twins – a boy and a girl named Wilson and Wilsolene.
CHECK OUR LATEST STORIES
Featured StoriesStoriesSyriaHealth and Nutrition
A new life for a clinic in Syria
"The clinic is ready!" The news was music to Dr Eyad's,(the director of Tal Salhab clinic), ears. Medair had just completed the rehabilitation of Tal Salhab's only primary health centre, providing it with much-needed medical equipment – offering a lifeline to over...
StoriesSudanWater, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH)
The Sudan crisis: how Medair is stepping in
Sudan crisis: how Medair is stepping in Twelve months into the armed conflict in Sudan, it has become the largest displacement crisis in the world. To date, 8.4 million people have been forced to flee their homes, and the number is growing every day. Families have...
StoriesUkraineHealth and NutritionMental Health
The Need for mental health support in Ukraine
“I really enjoyed the organization of these trainings. I’ve already gained a lot of interesting knowledge, which, it seems, I was already familiar with, but had never thought about it deeply. Learning new things, I understand how I can apply them in my work to...
StoriesMadagascarWater, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH)
Medair’s innovative response to drought
In southern Madagascar, Medair aims to play a key role in improving access to water, sanitation, and hygiene for vulnerable communities affected by drought and 'kere' (famine). Normally, people living in remote villages in southern Madagascar need to walk 10 to 40...
StoriesUkraineShelter and Infrastructure
Surviving Adversity
“Sometime around 6 a.m., my nephew called me and said, ‘Are you still sleeping? THE conflict has started.’ I shouted at my children to turn on the television to watch the news. I never thought I would experience something like this at my age. It was a terrifying...
StoriesJordanHealth and Nutrition
Health Improvement Journey
"We lost everything, our home and farm, therefore I left everything behind me. I carry hope to have a better place for me and for my family," Fozeh said, her voice heavy with the weight of displacement but her spirit resilient with the promise of a brighter future....
StoriesMadagascarWater, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH)Women & Children
Fetching water, a burden for women
In the struggle of finding clean water, women bear the heaviest load "In addition to my duties as a single mother, I have to fetch water three hours away every day," shares Farasoa, a 38-year-old divorcee raising seven children in the Fokontany of Ambory...
StoriesYemenHealth and Nutrition
From a shack to a health unit
Following nearly a decade of conflict in Yemen, the country has experienced a partial collapse of an already fragile public infrastructure, leaving approximately 66 percent of the population in dire need of humanitarian assistance. Yemen’s healthcare system has...