A Baby’s Cry
Being a mother myself, I never thought I would reach a point where a baby’s cry would become a background noise. I remember when my son was born and had to be admitted to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) for an infection he got from the labor ward. I would go in to feed him and find babies crying and the medical personnel would be busy going about their business. I felt anger and thought these people were heartless — how can they ignore a baby’s cry like that? Little did I know that one day I would be on the other side of the coin and actually act just the same as the health personnel I was condemning.
One of the projects I am participating in for my work placement under the Global Health Corps fellowship program with the Zambian Center for Applied Health Research and Development is conducting a study on nosocomial infections in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. I am there just two days a week to carry out quality assurance and help out with data collection.
For the first few weeks, every time I heard a baby cry I would stop whatever I was doing, go to the crib and pick the baby up and sing to them until they stopped or went to sleep. This went on for a few weeks, but soon my work increased and I couldn’t find time to pick a crying baby — even though my heart would break. But as weeks passed I soon stopped hearing the sounds of a crying baby; it became background noise.
After working there for three months — and only two days a week — I realized that already the sound of a baby crying is not as moving as the first time I heard it. It made me wonder, what about the health personnel who has been working for five years or more and goes there every day? It’s not that they are heartless but they have gotten so used to the sound of babies crying — and due to lack of manpower — cuddling a baby that is crying is not on the top on their list of things to do when there are babies that need resuscitation or there are reports to write. Does it make them heartless because they are not jumping every time a baby cries? Does it make them less human? Looking at the work environment and the number of workers available during each shift, it is impossible to be able to cuddle each baby that cries and still carry out all their duties as health workers and respond to emergencies or life threatening situations.
Does it make them heartless because they are not jumping every time a baby cries? Does it make them less human?
The health worker human resource crisis in Zambia is real and it is affecting the way we deliver our health care services. For instance, in the NICU you can find that in one room there is one nurse in charge of five to six neonates. This hinders their quality of service and also puts strain on the health workers as they are made to work way harder than normal to provide good quality of service to the neonates.
It still breaks my heart to hear babies crying for that love and attention the hours their mothers are not around, but nothing can be done because it would mean the health workers stop what there are doing and just give that attention and that again will mean loss of lives and a faster increase in infant mortality rate.
The issue of human resource for health crisis needs the attention from all stakeholders to ensure that enough health personnel are trained and employed by the government and retention schemes are in place to keep the health care providers. Until then, DON’T BE TOO QUICK TO JUDGE.
Lulu Chizuni is a 2015–2016 Global Health Corps fellow at Zambia Center for Applied Health Research and Development in Zambia. All GHC fellows, partners and supporters are united in a common belief: health is a human right. There is a role for everyone in the movement for health equity. Join the movement today.
