Lifesaving kits sent abroad

Lifesavers: Zonta members Lesley Blacklock and Carolyn Gilmore assemble birthing kits to send overseas.

Blainey Woodham

THERE is no greater gift than the best possible start in life.

That is the motto of a Tweed womens’ group sending life-starting and lifesaving birthing kits to developing nations.

Zonta Tweed-Southern Gold Coast is helping reduce infant and maternal mortality by donating birthing kits to Pakistan and other nations lacking modern hospital facilities.

The kits are basic yet vital for safe childbirth, consisting of a plastic sheet, soap, gloves, five gauze squares, three cords and a scalpel.

Zonta Australia has been assembling birthing kits for 10 years, and the Tweed chapter will hold its third assembly day on Saturday, September 18.

Birthing kit co-ordinator Jan Ingwersen said Zonta was always looking to help women and girls, and one of the things lacking in developing countries was healthy birth.

“A friend of mine who is a mid-wife in an African country said there was a practice of tying off the umbilical cord with a vine which had bacteria in it that could kill the baby,” Ms Ingwersen said.

“So this campaign is dear to our hearts, as we’ve all had very clean births.”

Zonta’s Birthing Kit Foundation has potentially saved thousands of children’s and mothers’ lives over the past three-years by paying for and assembling 3200 kits.

During assembly days, volunteers assemble kits the club pays $2 each for, then AusAID (Australian Agency for International Development) ships them where they are needed.

Ms Ingwersen said Zonta would assemble 600 kits during their next day, and help was welcomed.

“We do it under strict hygiene conditions, so we insist on washing hands and wearing gloves during some stages of assembly,” Ms Ingwersen said. “We’d love to provide more of these, but the costs have prevented us from assembling the 1600 we did last time.”

The United Nations World Health Organisation estimated in 1996 that 585,000 women died in childbirth every year, and developing nations accounted for 99 per cent of deaths.

The WHO also found that for every death, another 30 women suffered injuries and infections – many of which were painful, disabling, embarrassing and lifelong.