Far Away But Not Forgotten
High up in the Himalayas, there are a cluster of four villages in the Kumaon region, three hours by foot to the nearest road and seven hours from the nearest hospital.
One day a woman called Naveena found herself in a tiny village hearing the stories of the tribal women, and learning about their health. She felt that she could make a difference to their lives.
“Some friends of mine invited me to Kumaon,” says Naveena. “Where they run AVANI, an NGO focusing on textiles made on handmade looms and with natural dyes.”
AVANI are empowering people in 41 villages by creating a cooperative and now they want to focus on the health of the villagers who are challenged by their environment, both nutritionally and in terms of access to medical care.
“Our initial idea was to create a natural birthing centre in Kumaon, but that is a long way down the line. At around 2500m, this is a hostile environment. We want to create a centre for education. A lot of health problems could be prevented with basic health education. We need good staff, we need translators for training midwifes and before that, we need the basics - running water and electricity!”
Naveena Goffer
Hailing from Israel, Naveena Goffer has spent most of the last decade in New Zealand and India. She trained in midwifery in New Zealand and then worked in a hospital in a very international area in Auckland.
Then she moved to India and worked with Corinna (a German midwife) at the Natural Birthing Centre in Assagao, Goa, which opened her eyes to how holistic, and nurturing the birthing process can be.
“Having trekked the three hours up to these villages, I can only imagine how arduous living at this altitude is. But what strength of character and what joy! It was an honour to meet the women of the community. I thought that maybe 30 would turn up, but over 100 women turned up from all corners of the community. At the first women’s health meeting, we invited the women to ask questions and suddenly all the stories poured out. I heard a lot of tragic stories.”
The women spoke about being over worked and having children one after the other. And many of the women are in poor health, without access to proper medical care.
Naveena explains, “Infant and maternal death rate is unrecorded, but estimated as being really high. If a woman gives birth at home, which is typical here as it is so far from the hospital, there is no official record of the birth and then if that child dies, there is no official record of the death, so essentially the child never existed, and so it is hard to gauge the extent of the problem.”
“If a woman encounters problems during birth, she is simply too far from medical treatment, the family will not risk moving her and she and the baby die.”
Giving The Tools
“Our focus has to be on education. For quite a lot of the conditions that can arise during or after birth, simple health advice and techniques can help prevent problems.”
“Similarly, I heard a story about a newborn with a high fever. They kept him at home for three days, but they should have sought medical attention immediately and taken that three hour trek. The baby died. We need to give basic information.”
“I thought even though there was no access to doctors and trained midwifes in these remote villages, there would be a wealth of local wisdom and knowledge of herbal medicine. However, I discovered a lot of myths and superstitions around childbirth and pregnancy amongst the tribal peoples. It can be very frustrating trying to debunk some of these ridiculous myths and I think they are at the root of a lot of the health problems.”
“We also need to educate about basic nutrition. These are poor people but they are not always using all of their resources. They lack iron and yet they are surrounded by nettles, so we showed them how to make nettle tea. They will not buy meat or vegetables from the market as it’s too expensive, but again they can cook up the nettles as a vegetable or eat the pine nuts that grow wild.”
Naveena’s Work
“Last monsoon, we invited a few of the women down to Goa for some training at the Natural Birthing Centre. We focused on teaching them about blood pressure, foetus development, nutrition and the mechanisms of giving birth and what to expect. And they got to see the sea!”
Naveena will be running workshops in the Kumaon district with the help of AVANI. Simple things like determining a due date are on her list of things to teach.
“Often the women here are so strong, they have such taut stomach muscles from working in the fields and trekking in the mountains to the market, that they often do not know till the last couple of months that they are even pregnant.”
“I want to get input from international doctors, as well as Indian doctors and midwifes. The women are so open and receptive, they want to learn. We are sowing the seeds right now - sowing the seeds for core health through pre and post natal care.”
“I’m looking forward to going back in a few months time. Last year I was pregnant and this time I will be going back with my tiny daughter Koyal. I think they’ll be very excited to meet her. Despite their challenging environment, they are such joyous people. If you start to sing or dance, they will join you.”
To check out AVANI and the Kumaon Earthcraft Self Reliant Cooperative - http://www.avani-kumaon.org/.
AVANI started as the Kumaon Chapter of The Social Work and Research Center, also known as the Barefoot College, a renowned project which focuses on capacity building of the rural communities enabling them to handle their own issues.
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