ZONTA Birthing Kit workshop
It is a known fact that in Nigeria, 512 mothers pass away every year per 100 000 live births as a result of hygiene complications. Furthermore, ⅕ women in Australia experience domestic violence at least once in their lives. These gross phenomena are ones ZONTA aims to mitigate.
On the Saturday morning of 6 December, our school’s Zonta club and several other volunteers gathered in Brescia to complete two main objectives: pack 600 birthing kits and 150 Share The Dignity handbags.
Share the dignity is an initiative ZONTA has partnered up with, providing individuals (usually women and children) who have suffered from domestic violence, sanitary items that improve their quality of life. Items can range from pads to tampons and even shampoo.
In domestic violence situations, a person may not have the financial facilities for hygiene and thus for their own dignity as a consequence of their abuser’s financial manipulation. Therefore, there are many women (and men) in our own local communities who have had their intrinsic human rights violated unjustifiably. Such is where Share the Dignity handbags play a role.
On Saturday, we collated together 150 handbags full of shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, toothbrushes, combs and several other items that are then given to women’s domestic violence shelters. They end up well used, and empower women to prioritise their health and wellbeing, providing them a small (if not decent) foundation to flourish on following a traumatic relationship.
Similarly, the birthing kits we assembled contained objects such as soap, scalpels, pieces of string and gloves. The string facilitates easier passage to cutting the umbilical cord, while the glove, for example, prevents disease transmission between mothers and nurses. As a result, birthing kits dramatically reduce maternal and infant mortality in regions that lack sufficient healthcare systems for childbirth.
Inherently, these are not fixes for the systematic infrastructural deficiencies in these countries which are often fueled by government negligence, gender discrimination (of women) or national poverty. Birthing kits are, however, the means to approach gender healthcare equality and safer births, enabling those not born in the “lucky country” Australia, to still have some degree of healthcare access in the present.
No matter the reason or situation, it is imperative that we advocate and aid groups who have not been enabled their human rights, for that is the definition of a truly moral society.
Victoria Pandis
Year 10
