Eight Days as a PCV in Kore Hausa, Niger

I spent a total of eight whole days at my post in Niger. They were incredible.

Some of the most amazing and most difficult things I experienced were in the health hut, where I worked alongside my counterpart, Masbahou. From polio vaccinations to prenatal exams, the work was absolutely fascinating. I really don’t have words to describe what I saw or how excited I was to learn more… and the prospect of eventually being able to help people there.

A lot of crazy things happened, one in particular I’d like to share.

Sunday morning I was at the health clinic with Masbahou, practicing my Hausa, when I noticed a donkey kart approaching. I figured this probably meant something serious because generally people just walk.

Two women enter the clinic: one very young and one very old. The young woman (she’s probably 15 or 16) looks petrified. The older woman is carrying a large bundle of blankets, which she shows to Masbahou. They speak quickly in Hausa to each other, the whole time the younger woman looks terrified. I pick up something about a hand, a birth, home, and lots of “asha, asha”…which is kind of like saying darn, but you say it when people are sick.

Inside the bundle I realize there’s a baby! A newborn, whose tiny little left hand is swollen and purple. Masbahou looks it over, and speaks again with the older woman. They leave the health hut and walk over to the donkey kart and speak to the man there. They all come back inside, speaking quickly again. This time I catch the word medicine, and something about Matamaye, the bigger town with a hospital 12 km away.

At this point, Masbahou sees that I’m completely confused and gives me a brief explanation. The older woman is a traditional midwife, who delivered the young woman’s first child at home. Since the birth two days earlier, the baby’s hand has continued to swell and darken—probably an infection. Masbahou is prescribing ibuprofen and amoxicillin, but the health hut in Kore Hausa stocks neither; they will have to wait until the next day when someone can go to Matamaye to buy them.

Then, family leaves and Masbahou tells me the midwife is not a real midwife. There are several trained midwives who know how to look for complication signs during pregnancy, and always bring women in labor to the clinic. This midwife is not, and she did not. Masbahou thinks perhaps the baby’s head was not well positioned during the deliver; the hand probably came out first.

“Are there many problems?” I ask.

“No problems, incha Allah,” Masbahou assures me. “Tomorrow the baby will drink medicine: amoxicillin and ibuprofen, and then no problems”.

A health facility that serves over 3,000 people doesn’t stock amoxicillin or ibuprofen.