“Gloria, but tell me, why do you have so many children?” — that is the opening question in the account of an Ambrosoli Foundation volunteer who travelled to Kalongo, where a school trains women to become qualified midwives first and foremost.
"Gloria, but tell me, why do you have so many children?" I ask one of the students at the St. Mary Midwifery School in Kalongo. Yes, why? In Kalongo, there are only children. Around the Ambrosoli hospital there are at least ten schools, and every class in every school has more than 150 children. You notice when lessons end, because they sweep everything away. There are thousands and thousands of them. They look like ants gone wild, impossible to count. From the tiniest ones, holding hands, to the slightly older ones. All of them, in any case, always out and about on their own — no mums or dads in sight.
And then you see only pregnant women. They all have big bellies. Each of them has at least seven or eight children, one every two years. And if one doesn't survive, well, they have another. Many men are also polygamous. They have as many as five or six wives, so they end up with 40 children (forty!). With what money do they support them, with what money do they send them to school, when they have no money? The more children they have, the poorer they become. But why so many, then?
"You shouldn't be asking me. You should ask the men. Because it's the men who decide how many children a woman must have — and she cannot say no." And men want many, because the more they have, the more powerful they are considered by the community. But above all, the more they have, the greater the chance that at least one won't be a layabout and will do something decent with his life, also for his own family. What role does the woman have in all of this? Nothing to be done. No role at all. It is the man who decides, full stop. When to have children, how many times to give birth. And it cannot be contradicted.
Women, in African culture, have no voice. And many of them — still far too many — die in childbirth. The maternal mortality rate in Uganda is 360 women per 100,000 live births (in Italy it is three). In rural areas, where 90 per cent of Uganda's population lives, antenatal check-ups (meaning prenatal visits) involve only 46 per cent of women. In rural areas, in fact, the majority of pregnant women in normal health conditions do not undergo any form of preventive healthcare check, and it is often traditional birth attendants who, where possible, travel to the homes of expectant mothers to assess the progress of the pregnancy. Because healthcare facilities are inaccessible, women frequently turn to health centres only in cases of serious emergency. But sometimes, unfortunately, it is too late to save their lives.
In Kalongo, the experience and the sure, loving hands of the students of St. Mary Midwifery School are there to care for the very young mothers-to-be — the midwifery school founded in 1957 by Father Giuseppe Ambrosoli alongside the hospital that today bears his name. From the very beginning of his work in Uganda, Father Ambrosoli was determined to train local staff and, above all, he understood the role that women could play in this community. Today St. Mary is a flagship institution, one of the finest midwifery schools in Uganda, which since its founding has graduated more than 1,300 professional midwives.
"If you educate a young person, you educate one person. If you educate a woman, you educate a family, a nation."
(African proverb)
The training of midwives is essential for saving the lives of young mothers and newborns, but it goes beyond midwifery alone. Sister Carmel, the school's director, works to bring about a cultural change that can only happen through educating young African women towards professional, economic and decision-making autonomy. She begins with her own students, teaching them midwifery skills but also dignity and self-esteem as women. With her infectious enthusiasm, she works not only to make them professionals, but also to prepare them for the life that awaits them. To become "advocates" for those who have no voice.