Child Development and Public Health

I thought about how important the use of clean water. It serves many purposes and we could not survive without it. The first thing that comes to mind when think of clean water is it is used for drinking, cooking and washing. As a teacher I continue to encourage my children to consume more water instead of soft drinks and juices. In one part of Africa the use of clean healthy water is a problem that has been on the rise for many years. People use buckets to gather water from a watering hole. If and when that hole runs dry another has to dig in a new area. This same watering hole may be used by local business, families or medicals facilities. In Blantyre the population has grown from 113,000 in 1966 to 670,000 in 2008, according to the National Statistical Office. Because there is not suffient clean water, dirty linen from the hospitals are left soiled and bloodied. The workers continue to complain because there is not way to wash the linens or the patients.

In an article from the 2003 CNN (Water shortages may make Africa more aid dependent) experts say that by 2025 as many as 523 million people in Africa may be without access to clean water. This means that farmers will not have enough water for their crops. Since many parts of Africa are in droughts that lack of water any were will affect every part.


A couple of years ago I started to really monitor how often my own children drank water. Their drinks consisted of sodas, juices and just like mind lots of sweet tea. In a week my family consumed about 10 to 15 pounds of sugary drinks. So with that being said I stopped buying sodas, I did not make kool-aid. The sweet teas I still struggle with. (I just do not make it at home for the kids). I switched to crystal lights and I put a water cooler in the kitchen. My children are more aware of the importance of clean water for their bodies and I can tell they are making better choices on their own with their drinks when away from home.
Sources:

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/11/01/water.shortage.reut/%20retrieved
September 18, 2018 from Water shortages may make Africa more aid dependent


Hospitals Struggle Amid Water Shortage by Charles Mpak/http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=56886 / retrieved September 18, 2011

Childbirth––In Your Life and Around the World

I remember the birth of each of my children like it was yesterday. Each was completely different and each made me feel differently as far as being a new mother and the new things I would do with that particular child. In the readings I learned more about how the mental state of the mother effects the fetus. The first birth was a boy, I was 18 and in a different state of mind than with the later births. This child was later diagnosed with cerebal palsy and developmentally delayed. I am not sure if my worrying about having a child so young, without being married or what everyone would, think had anything to do with his problems, but as a young mother of course i blamed myself. With each of the other births I know that I was extra nervous as each birth got closer because of the unknown.

As I looked at births around the world I choose to focus on Guatemala. This is the population that i am in most contact with in my classroom so I thought I would find out more about the beginning life of the mothers and grandmothers of the children that i deal with. What I found is that most of the midwives have minimal to no training,lack the skills to provide life threatening techniques to expecting babies or mothers mothers. Women that take on the midwife (Comadronas)role are normally women that is trusted in the community and are usually older respected women. Some of the problems that take place is the lack of vehicles to get to the doctors or hospital, sanitation areas and even the location of a help center. Like my own births i had much family support. So I found that in most non-Western cultures the birth of a child in this area of care is the same. The family members (especially female relatives) provide strong social support and take care of the majority of the mothers and the new born child needs. The midwife continues to also provide care and support of the mother and child.(Holroyd et al., 1997;Nahas & Amashen, 1999).

With the birthrate in these rural ares (BIRTH RATE: 39.6 births per 1000 persons) http://www.quetzalnet.com/c_profile.html so low i understand why a lot of these families make every attempt to come to the US. Here they receive the proper care for the mother and child. They also learn better ways to insure a healthy and happy child.