The New Age
Andrew Molefe
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Dr Medeshni Annamalai, 31, paediatrician, Edendale Hospital, Pietermaritzburg
The petite, young South African doctor Medeshni Annamalai only recently heard about Gift of the Givers, a SA charity organisation based in Pietermaritzburg.
The 31-year-old paediatrician at the Edendale Hospital had mixed feelings about coming to Somali for the first time. She didn’t know what to expect.
“Gift of the Givers came to my hospital looking for volunteers to join them on the mercy mission to Somalia. I was apprehensive at first. My limited knowledge of the country was formed by the media. I had pictures of a war-torn country as shown on television and children with big stomachs dying of starvation,” she said.
She said her family was also not overly excited about her trip to Mogadishu, considered to be the most dangerous city in the world to live in. But they were also glad that she was going to the devastated country to help – and perhaps save lives.
On the day of the interview, she had already done one day’s work at the Banadir Hospital and had already treated a few people but was concerned that the chaotic conditions at the hospital prevented her and her team from seeing more patients. Most of the patients are children and the elderly who are suffering from measles, malaria and malnutrition, as well as a general lack of medical attention.
The majority of them have terrible self-inflicted burns like one would get from a cigarette burn. Apparently it is a traditional ritual and they believed that the burn will heal them.
“I was overwhelmed about what I saw on the first day but I will gladly come back whenever the opportunity presents itself again.”
Dr Will Edridge, gynaecologist, Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, Soweto
Besides what he calls a fascinating experience in Mogadishu, Dr Edridge has an interesting take on his and other South African doctors’ experiences during this mission. He said they were taken aback by the complete lack of records at the Banadir Hospital where they were stationed on their arrival.
“Patients were not recorded. We did not know which medicines were prescribed to them. There were no records of their medical histories.”
He said what was even more depressing was the way inpatients were distributed among private doctors and that there was obvious favouritism of some patients over others.
“Doctors, nurses and translators seem to have their own people whom they rushed up the queue even when they clearly didn’t show signs of being sicker than other patients. And, of course, there are cultural experiences, things we didn’t understand. We, as South Africans, judge things on a mercy-mission perspective where we operate in a free system away from favouritism.”
Dr Sipho Qonde, emergency care technician, Klerksdorp, North West EMRS Services
Dr Qonde started volunteering for the Gift of the Givers three years ago. He had planned to go with them to Japan when the earthquake hit the island early this year. It didn’t happen until the crisis hit nearer home in Somalia. He applied and was accepted immediately. Somalia was like a thunderbolt from the blue and he didn’t know what to expect.
He had always had an urge to help, even when growing up on the farms around Ventersdorp, a verkrampte dorpie in the North West.
I am excited to have been a member of the Somali mission and would be back in a jiffy, if asked. The issue of whether it would be safe did crop up but I realised if we could save just one life, the trip would have been worthwhile.”
Dr Qonde said that though he was happy that the medical team did save lives, nothing could have compared with the smiles ignited on the patients’ faces upon learning that they were treated by South Africans. He said he will carry these images with him for the rest of his life. “They have seen many doctors from different countries – Turkey, Dubai, the Emirates and everywhere – but the mention of South Africa gave them a positive glow. It was touching for me when they called me ‘brother’.”
He gets emotional when he thinks of sporadic incidents of xenophobia back home. “We should try and treat Somalis with some respect. These guys loves us.”
Dr Erna Morden, 27, dietician, Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, Soweto
Somalia was Dr Morden’s first foreign assignment and she was not going to let this golden opportunity pass her by. She had 100% support from her family who encouraged her to take up this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Dr Morden, who works at what is punted as the biggest hospital in the world, said the cases she treated since she arrived in the Somali capital were not much different from those she handled at Bara.
“The only difference is that here the cases are slightly worse and malnutrition more acute.” She said most of the malnutrition cases at Bara are economic refugees who fled their countries to come to Johannesburg.
“They have no access to decent amenities, staying in squatter camps where there is no clean water and surviving on a poor diet. Here in Somalia, these people have no adequate medical care and are therefore vulnerable to opportunistic diseases.”
This outdoors-type girl, who practises photography as a hobby, said the situation in Somalia is made sadder by the fact that it was a natural disaster and no one is to blame. Four days into the mission, she still feels like pinching herself to see that it is still real.