Births in bushes
Taboo forces mothers to use the bushes as labour ward . . .
By peter korugl
Women in one part of Papua New Guinea have been giving birth to their children in the bush and did not go to the nearest aid post because the facility is managed by a male. This is due to an age old traditional taboo that does not allow men to to assist during labour or births in that part of the country, according to an official government report.
The womenfolk live at Pawaia, at the border of Gulf and Chimbu Provinces and they are part of the population that are landowners of Elk and Antelope, the huge oil and gas deposit discovered by InterOil Products Ltd recently.
According to the report, the traditional custom in the area in Gulf Province, located at the northern tip of Baimuru and is about 32 km inside the Chimbu border, has prevented the mothers from getting help from the aid post.
Thank God for those who are living and were born that way were very lucky to be alive, the report said. The report was compiled by Raphael Komainde, the man in charge of the Geotech office in Kundiawa, Chimbu Province.
MR KOMAINDE said in his report that he was shocked to learn during his visits to the area that at this age and time, women were forced by custom to deliver their babies in the bush.
The labouring mothers were placed at the edge of the village in the bush and after they deliver their babies, they were again placed in a nursery, made out of bush materials for one week before they return to their family home.
During this time they were not allowed to get any help for their husbands or any other men, they can get help from women in the village.
This is shocking and risky to both the mothers and their babies. Where there are no health facilities, it is more risky, the report stated.
The report said a long stick was placed from a cliff side to a small tree truck.
The floor was wet and moist and there is no wall at all on both sides but shrubs provide the only shelter for the mother in labour.
On the top, green leaves are placed with just one coconut branch covering the labour ward.
There is not dry grass cushion for the mother to rest and deliver the baby, the report highlighted.
The report said after the baby is born alive with the help of an untrained midwife, the mother and ther baby remain in a temporary hut which is about three metres away from the family home, for one week.
The temporary hut has no proper roof, wall or door.
The mortality rate is expected to be very high in such a place where there are no better health facilities, ambulance and qualified medical officers close by, Mr Komainde said.
There is no clinic and immunisation programs in the Pawaia area expect on the Chimbu side of the border where the Haia sub health centre is located.
The Poroi aid post was manned by John Peneai, the son of the paramount chief, who received formal education up to grade 8.
He had to travel for days to Kerema to get the medical supplies by canoe and return to Pawaia.
But the women in labour do not go to the aid post because their custom prevents them. It is taboo for men to attend to births and the aid post is manned by a male, Mr Komainde explained his report to the Post-Courier in Port Moresby yesterday.
John gets his medicines from Kerema but it is very difficult to refer patients because there is no transportation, Mr Komainde said.
He said even if a better health facility was built, it would need female workers to be there to assist women during birth, otherwise an health facility without females is of no use to the mothers.
"Go back to your village and work the land and stop flooding the towns" said our famous PM Somare to Aljazeera some time ago. What an ironic, insensitive, uncaring, irresponsible statement. After more than 30yrs png villagers are still the same...most more worse then they were before independence. I would be willing to live in the village with my kaukau and kumu as long as I have the following provided:
1. access to health centre fully stocked with medicine within walking distance.
2. community and high schools within my community for my childrens educationl
3. maintained transport system...eg. roads, airstrips, wharfs with easy access to the nearest town centre for me to sell my cash crop and buy my simple nececities such as soap, oil, kero, etc.,
IS THAT TOOO MUCH TO ASK, MR GOVERNMENT????????????
I am not asking for a brand new land cruizer with "donated by the honorable...etc." written on it. I am not asking for handouts of money/compensation. I am not asking for lamb flaps and cows for a party.... I am not even asking for subsidies. all i want is live life in the village, just like you want me to. but with the basic three things provided..... So i live life honestly, with dignity and with pride in my motherland. Otherwise we will still flood the towns cause village life sucks. Its just plain hard living.
my thoughts and prayers to the mothers in remote places.
whats the big deal ladies , there is nothing wrong giving birth in a bush haus or a village house. for hundreds of years now woman had been giving births every where. its a norm in humaninty for woman to give birth.
i was born in a garden haus and nothing is wrong with that.
So was I, my mother had me in a pigs house outside the garden fences. BUT DO I WEAR ASS TANGET AND PURPUR today sitting in my office typing on my computer and answering phone calls? Do I go looking for the village puripuri man when i am sick with malaria or my child has kus?.... Do i live in a house kunai with no blanket but a bunch of leaves and a nice piece of wood for my pillow like my dad used when i was a small kid?. Or rather when i go to my little garden do i take my diggin stick and leave behind my "modern" spade and bushknife ... because after all like you said our ancestors have been doing it for thousands of years... Or when i need to break fire wood do i reach for my stone axe or my tramontina axe??????????
YU MAS WANFALA LIKLIK TINTIN MAHN OR MERI YA..... Times have changed. Our women deserve to give birth in a hospital. It is by right theirs and the childs right tooo. Your kinda mentality is what is feeding the so called much talked about "PNG attitude problem"
So i will tell you one thing. You have no right to wear western clothes.... wear your malo or ass tanget, you have no right to western medicine..go painim puripuri man blo yu lon ples...you have no right to education... lainim lon ol lapun lon ples...you have no right to a hospital next time your wife wants to have a baby.. take her to the liklik haus arere lon gaden.....
Anon you cry baby, that adopted civilisation and have lost you pride (tradition,customary obligations.
Sitting behind a computer and you think that makes you a woman. You will self pity urself because you depend so much on mostly dummy biscuit drugs that psychologically fool your brain to change your self-pity mood to a lil happy tiger when ever you fall sick. No wonder urban woman are subjected to many forms of cancer treats, alegies, high blood pressure, etc.. then those who are not exposed to modern medicines and lifestyle like thoes who live in the remote villages.
Real woman are out there and are very conservative when it come to tradition. The real story was no shock for the people of that area. They have survived and will continue to exist as long as their tradition is preserved why all of a sudden someone is concern.
It was no big deal till some idiots went up to the papers and told of their own opinion about what they saw. People of Pawaia have no problems what so ever with preserving their age old tradition and their woman folks are just as happy delivering healthy babies.
if you cant help change a thing better leave it as it is. people of Pawaia aren't complaining and asking your help.
I have not lost my pride and definatly not my identity as a women. I am rich in my culture and roots. I thrive in it. I have given birth to 3 children and one of them in the village. But you as a man will never understand the incredible pain and discomfort and life threatening experience of giving birth in a bush hut with no modern facilities. I am not a cry baby and neither are my fellow sisters and mothers out in the bush yearning for their baby to be born in a hospital. These are modern times now, we don't live in a stone age time. The women folk in the village deserve better because it is by law and right theirs. Just like our children have a right to education.
The three simple things by right should be provided by our government.
1. Health service
2. Education
3. Transport
And the government has failed.
as for you mr.hah, I pity your peabrain sense and lack of understanding on this issue.
Okay your not a peabrain. just a slip of fingers on the key board over something i feel so strongly about. I have helped so many women to the hospital and seen lives saved by simple modern facilities provided.
You know not all babies born in bush huts do survive.Neither do all mothers who have to give birth in such a way because they have no choice.
We are in the 21st Century and in a bush hut there is little that can be done for the poor mother who may have a retained placenta and is too far away from an experienced midwife who could save her life so easily.
Little help is available in a bush hut in the middle of nowhere when a mother needs a caesarian and doesn't know it until the last few minutes of her,or her babies, life.
Until men are given the biological "facilities" to enable them to give birth I don't think that too many women are too interested in hearing their opinions any more than we women would dare or bother to comment on male castration which is probably quite a good idea but one area where we don't dare to venture.
You wrote
You know not all babies born in bush huts do survive. Neither do all mothers who have to give birth in such a way because they have no choice. We are in the 21st Century and in a bush hut there is little that can be done for the poor mother who may have a retained placenta and is too far away from an experienced midwife who could save her life so easily. Little help is available in a bush hut in the middle of nowhere when a mother needs a caesarian and doesn't know it until the last few minutes of her, or her babies, life
- I dont agree,
Women mothers give birth because they made their choices 9 moons +- 10 days prior to birthing process. Women choose to give birth, they choose to retain their traditions and customs and give birth in bush house. If she dies in the process, thats call natural selection. Survival of the fittest.
Your mothers survive bush house births and their fore mothers survive that too thats the evidence of your existence. Women beings survive births for the last 20ths century.
.
You wrote
Until men are given the biological "facilities" to enable them to give birth I don't think that too many women are too interested in hearing their opinions any more than we women would dare or bother to comment on male castration which is probably quite a good idea but one area where we don't dare to venture.
- sorry to hear your sentiment of being a woman and not a male.