Between 2014 and 2017, dispensaries in terror-prone areas, including Lamu, were vandalised and torched by al Shabaab militants. They kept raiding the facilities, forcing medical staff to flee and leaving locals at the fate of destiny.
Today, many of these dispensaries still stand desolate, with no one to run them.
It therefore came as welcome news for Lamu residents when on November 15, the county government and the Safaricom Foundation signed a Sh6.8 million deal to establish the first-ever maternal health shelter. This will enable pregnant women in the region to have easy and fast access to skilled birth attendants.
The shelter is being set up at the Witu Health centre in Lamu West.
Construction is already underway, and the facility is expected to be complete and ready for use by January 2019.
The shelter will offer a temporary home, while at the same time serving as a waiting and observation centre for pregnant mothers, who will be allowed to board there as they deliver their babies under the watchful eye of professional maternal caregivers.
Safaricom’s Janice Mwendameru says the shelter will reduce the burden of women and mothers having to travel long distances just to deliver their babies.
Once complete, the facility will be able to hold at least 50 mothers daily, who will be allowed to come camp at the shelter in the last weeks of their pregnancy for close monitoring.
Lamu Governor Fahim Twaha says, “With this approach, we are sure to guarantee hospital deliveries for these mothers and also reduce the number of maternal and newborn deaths normally caused when these mothers are attended to by traditional attendants, who have no clue what to do when an emergency arises."
Statistics obtained from the Lamu County Health office show that at least 200 mothers struggle to attend antenatal clinics at the nearest Witu Health Centre every month.
However, of this number, less than 15 come back for a hospital delivery.
County Health director David Mulewa, however, says the situation will be easily corrected once the shelter is up and running next year.
“By the end of next year, we are definitely going to have different and better statistics regarding maternal and newborn births here. The shelter couldn’t have come at a better time,” he says.
In June, the same foundation launched a Sh44 Million Maternal, Newborn and Child Health programme, which is to be implemented over three years in three counties, starting with Lamu.
The Maternal Health Shelter is an integral part of the programme.
Lamu is among counties with the highest maternal deaths in Kenya, with an estimated 676 mothers dying for every 100,000 births recorded.
The number is way above the national average of 362 mothers dying for every 100,000 live births.
The governor is, however, optimistic that these statistics are bound to immediately change once the maternal shelter becomes operational.
While admitting the tough experience that is childbirth, Twaha said many mothers die simply because they cannot afford to walk for longer distances to the hospital. He said the maternal shelter will now make it easier and safer for mothers to safely have their babies and get any attention they may need before being allowed to leave with their newborns.
“We are so glad to be looking to such a facility in Lamu.
It is
a commitment we have to ensuring we remove the tag that Lamu has the highest maternal deaths. We plan to have many more such shelters all around the region, so that women from all corners of Lamu feel safe to go there and have their babies, without having to worry of dying while at it or losing their babies either,” Twaha said.