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Bertha Serwa Ayi's Blog
Welcome! This site will be discussing issues of relevance to African Development. Such as investing in human capital and discussing health and education issues like malaria and HIV that are decimating our young and bright. Not fun topics but clearly for the serious minded.
Blog Archive
About Me
- Serwa
- I am a Board Certified Infectious Diseases Specialist. I have authored articles in leading medical journals, book chapters, and several internet publications. You can learn more about me on my website www.BerthaAyi.com. I grew up in Accra, Ghana and earned my medical degree from the University of Ghana Medical School. I completed residency in Internal Medicine at Good Samaritan Hospital affiliated with The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.I then completed a fellowship in Infectious Diseases at a combined training program at The Nebraska Medical Center, Creighton University Medical Center and the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska. I am currently the Associate Medical Director of Mercy Infectious Disease and Epidemiology Center in Sioux City, Iowa. She received an appointment as an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the department of Medicine at the Nebraska Medical Center in 2004 and is still on faculty. I am married with three sons. I love reading. I spend a lot of my time teaching my boys how to"occupy" in the next generation.
Things To Consider
As the rest of the world focuses on Millenium Development goals to be achieved by 2015. I am reminded about some major issues that face developing countries especially those in Sub Saharan Africa.
In 1988, I honored my National Service Obligations by teaching Science at a Junior Secondary School in Nuamakrom, a small town in the Central Region of Ghana. Close family members were very much against that whole idea of a teenager venturing out on her own to undertake this task. But I was insistent on going and looked forward to it.
It was a heart rending experience. Much as I tried to prepare lecture notes and teach Science, I was surprised to find that these children could not read much less understand science. I tried to express the concepts in their local language. It was hard. In the end I mutated into an English teacher, teaching them what they should have taught in Kindergarten- phonics and sentence formation.
As if this was not frustrating enough, occasionally local farmers or contractors will show up and request for the services of these children to transport gravel, weed their farms or harvest crop or some other menial task for which they should be hiring the labor of grown adults. My class will have to be terminated at whatever stage I was teaching. The revenue from this child labor did not accrue to the parents. I never inquired as to whether it went to a school fund or a teachers' pockets.
I think child labor is bad enough, but to undertake it at the compromise of a child's education is terrible. My heart ached everyday. I knew this was probably a reflection of a practice institutionalized in several small towns.
A year came by. I had been accepted into Medical School. It was time to show up for my first year of Medical School. Becuase I felt I had made a difference in the lives of these children, I wanted to postpone Medical School for one more year . We had made some headway with reading in spite of the rude interruptions by local entrepreneurs and farmers.
I almost skipped Medical School because of those dear children. My father sent by big brother to come and get me and shake me out of my reverie.
It has been twenty years since that that time. Those children are now young adults in their late twenties or early thirties- most likely uneducated and struggling to make ends meet. Attention to their education will have made all the difference in their lives.
Malaria eradication is another issue that I think about a lot. As a child and even through High School I experienced so many bouts of malaria that I lost count. As a Pediatrics house officer at KorleBu Teaching Hospital in Accra, Ghana, I vividly recollect the children who were rushed into the emergency room at various times either dead en route to the hospital from heart failure precipitated by severe anemia from malaria, or those who came in with a hemoglobin of 2 mg/dl from anemia and died in spite of blood tranfusions and resucitation efforts. Times have not changed much since.
Once upon a time, malaria was endemic in the Southern United States. It took only four years of committed eradication efforts from 1947-1951 to eradicate malaria from the United States. Read it for yourself here. http://www.cdc.gov/malaria/history/index.htm
By 1951, malaria was eradicated from the United States. Africa is still struggling with malaria control. In spite of the fact the United States was able to eradicate malaria, the World Heath Organisation has abandoned the term eradication and is now focusing on control. http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol4no3/nchinda.htm
http://www.case.edu/med/epidbio/mphp439/Malaria.htm
After almost a decade of billions of dollars donated to the cause of malaria control with little result, I think it is high time the issue of eradication be revisited with the use of spraying to remove the vector. How does the child living in a village, whose parents earn less than $1 a day, sleeping on a floor mat, find a place to tie this nets to four 'non existent' bed posts and hang a mosquito nets. Besides I think policy makers forget that these mosquitoes bite from dusk to dawn- they do not wait for you to get into bed. Unfortunately donors have never lived in an African village and therefore do not appreciate the realities of the use of mosquito nets. When I visited Ghana recently, I took my children to the beach. We had too much fun and overstayed the welcome of the mosquitoes. We should have left at 5:00 pm. By 6:00 there was a thick cloud of mosquitoes (It reminded me of the ten plagues in the Bible). My son was literally covered from his scapl to his feet with mosquito bites.
I think the malaria issue is about revamping our sewerage system to ensure we don't bodies of water that will habor these mosquitoes and improving the socio economic conditions of people living in these areas, so they can live in places with improved sanitations and homes with netting. To divorce malaria eradication from improving socio economic conditions is a fallacy. Unfortunately most donors feel more comforatable knowing that their monies are spent buying mosquito nets and anti- malaria medications. I beg to voice that if they truly want malaria to be eradicated they should also focus on the sewerage systems of these countries. We praise their efforts becuase they are thinking outside of themselves. They are confortable where they are- they are not obligated to take care of Africa. But the African leaders themselves!!! Are they committed to eradicating malaria. Are they devoting resources to improve the sewer systems? Do they talk about malaria as if it matters? Are they aware that every school day lost, or work day lost decreases the productivity of the nations they head? I don't know. On a recent visit to Accra, I visited the Ministries- the hub of decision making leaders. Right in front one of the more prominent ministry buildings, there was a gutter almost 80% full of brackish water and littered with black polyethylene bags and trash. And I thought to myself, this is not even in the village, this is right where Ministers of State park and walk past to their offices everyday. Do they know that gutter is breeding tons of mosquito larvae that will happily jump out at dusk. If the leaders of the nation have ditches of this nature less than 20 feet away from their offices, then we really need to ramp up malaria education and ask ourselves are all the monies on mosquito nets worth it? All the drugs? Maybe we need to increase the capacity of the sewarage workers to clean up breeding places of these mosquitoes. If United States was able to eradicate malaria in less than fie years, Africa should be able to undertake this task as well if we are committed.
Enough said, Policy makers will need to start thinking "Generationally" and ensuring that the next generation of Africans (who are now four to ten years old) have access to quality education and health. Otherwise in thirty years' time Africa will still be where it is and maybe worse. The current trend of poverty, lack, disease and ignorance can end with appropriate focus on building human capital right from kindergarten. I salute the efforts of those who are investing in tertiary education. Which is equally important considering the fact that if young people get good basic and secondary education, they will need tertiary institutions to hone their skills and also the fact that in several African countries only 3% of the tertiary school -going age have had such education.
On a recent visit to Accra, Ghana, I saw throngs of young men and women selling anywhere from dog chains to apples on the streets. In my minds eye, I saw medical doctors that never were, I saw lawyers, accountants, University professors that never were. The system had failed them. Most of them had grown up in towns like Nuamakrom, where they were never given a chance to get a good education. It was not as though they did not have the intellect. Opportunities were taken away by people who did not see future doctors, teachers and lawyers in them. They became what people determined they would be.
If Africa does not invest in children, thirty years from now there will not be much progress. As the world works hard to achieve Millenium Development goals of eradicating poverty and ensuring basic education to less fortunate countries, I salute those who are committed to the tasks and encourage those who are not to think deeply about contributin in one way or another.http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/
In 1988, I honored my National Service Obligations by teaching Science at a Junior Secondary School in Nuamakrom, a small town in the Central Region of Ghana. Close family members were very much against that whole idea of a teenager venturing out on her own to undertake this task. But I was insistent on going and looked forward to it.
It was a heart rending experience. Much as I tried to prepare lecture notes and teach Science, I was surprised to find that these children could not read much less understand science. I tried to express the concepts in their local language. It was hard. In the end I mutated into an English teacher, teaching them what they should have taught in Kindergarten- phonics and sentence formation.
As if this was not frustrating enough, occasionally local farmers or contractors will show up and request for the services of these children to transport gravel, weed their farms or harvest crop or some other menial task for which they should be hiring the labor of grown adults. My class will have to be terminated at whatever stage I was teaching. The revenue from this child labor did not accrue to the parents. I never inquired as to whether it went to a school fund or a teachers' pockets.
I think child labor is bad enough, but to undertake it at the compromise of a child's education is terrible. My heart ached everyday. I knew this was probably a reflection of a practice institutionalized in several small towns.
A year came by. I had been accepted into Medical School. It was time to show up for my first year of Medical School. Becuase I felt I had made a difference in the lives of these children, I wanted to postpone Medical School for one more year . We had made some headway with reading in spite of the rude interruptions by local entrepreneurs and farmers.
I almost skipped Medical School because of those dear children. My father sent by big brother to come and get me and shake me out of my reverie.
It has been twenty years since that that time. Those children are now young adults in their late twenties or early thirties- most likely uneducated and struggling to make ends meet. Attention to their education will have made all the difference in their lives.
Malaria eradication is another issue that I think about a lot. As a child and even through High School I experienced so many bouts of malaria that I lost count. As a Pediatrics house officer at KorleBu Teaching Hospital in Accra, Ghana, I vividly recollect the children who were rushed into the emergency room at various times either dead en route to the hospital from heart failure precipitated by severe anemia from malaria, or those who came in with a hemoglobin of 2 mg/dl from anemia and died in spite of blood tranfusions and resucitation efforts. Times have not changed much since.
Once upon a time, malaria was endemic in the Southern United States. It took only four years of committed eradication efforts from 1947-1951 to eradicate malaria from the United States. Read it for yourself here. http://www.cdc.gov/malaria/history/index.htm
By 1951, malaria was eradicated from the United States. Africa is still struggling with malaria control. In spite of the fact the United States was able to eradicate malaria, the World Heath Organisation has abandoned the term eradication and is now focusing on control. http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol4no3/nchinda.htm
http://www.case.edu/med/epidbio/mphp439/Malaria.htm
After almost a decade of billions of dollars donated to the cause of malaria control with little result, I think it is high time the issue of eradication be revisited with the use of spraying to remove the vector. How does the child living in a village, whose parents earn less than $1 a day, sleeping on a floor mat, find a place to tie this nets to four 'non existent' bed posts and hang a mosquito nets. Besides I think policy makers forget that these mosquitoes bite from dusk to dawn- they do not wait for you to get into bed. Unfortunately donors have never lived in an African village and therefore do not appreciate the realities of the use of mosquito nets. When I visited Ghana recently, I took my children to the beach. We had too much fun and overstayed the welcome of the mosquitoes. We should have left at 5:00 pm. By 6:00 there was a thick cloud of mosquitoes (It reminded me of the ten plagues in the Bible). My son was literally covered from his scapl to his feet with mosquito bites.
I think the malaria issue is about revamping our sewerage system to ensure we don't bodies of water that will habor these mosquitoes and improving the socio economic conditions of people living in these areas, so they can live in places with improved sanitations and homes with netting. To divorce malaria eradication from improving socio economic conditions is a fallacy. Unfortunately most donors feel more comforatable knowing that their monies are spent buying mosquito nets and anti- malaria medications. I beg to voice that if they truly want malaria to be eradicated they should also focus on the sewerage systems of these countries. We praise their efforts becuase they are thinking outside of themselves. They are confortable where they are- they are not obligated to take care of Africa. But the African leaders themselves!!! Are they committed to eradicating malaria. Are they devoting resources to improve the sewer systems? Do they talk about malaria as if it matters? Are they aware that every school day lost, or work day lost decreases the productivity of the nations they head? I don't know. On a recent visit to Accra, I visited the Ministries- the hub of decision making leaders. Right in front one of the more prominent ministry buildings, there was a gutter almost 80% full of brackish water and littered with black polyethylene bags and trash. And I thought to myself, this is not even in the village, this is right where Ministers of State park and walk past to their offices everyday. Do they know that gutter is breeding tons of mosquito larvae that will happily jump out at dusk. If the leaders of the nation have ditches of this nature less than 20 feet away from their offices, then we really need to ramp up malaria education and ask ourselves are all the monies on mosquito nets worth it? All the drugs? Maybe we need to increase the capacity of the sewarage workers to clean up breeding places of these mosquitoes. If United States was able to eradicate malaria in less than fie years, Africa should be able to undertake this task as well if we are committed.
Enough said, Policy makers will need to start thinking "Generationally" and ensuring that the next generation of Africans (who are now four to ten years old) have access to quality education and health. Otherwise in thirty years' time Africa will still be where it is and maybe worse. The current trend of poverty, lack, disease and ignorance can end with appropriate focus on building human capital right from kindergarten. I salute the efforts of those who are investing in tertiary education. Which is equally important considering the fact that if young people get good basic and secondary education, they will need tertiary institutions to hone their skills and also the fact that in several African countries only 3% of the tertiary school -going age have had such education.
On a recent visit to Accra, Ghana, I saw throngs of young men and women selling anywhere from dog chains to apples on the streets. In my minds eye, I saw medical doctors that never were, I saw lawyers, accountants, University professors that never were. The system had failed them. Most of them had grown up in towns like Nuamakrom, where they were never given a chance to get a good education. It was not as though they did not have the intellect. Opportunities were taken away by people who did not see future doctors, teachers and lawyers in them. They became what people determined they would be.
If Africa does not invest in children, thirty years from now there will not be much progress. As the world works hard to achieve Millenium Development goals of eradicating poverty and ensuring basic education to less fortunate countries, I salute those who are committed to the tasks and encourage those who are not to think deeply about contributin in one way or another.http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/
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