This is reflect the social and economic level of the country. Since five years, French surgeons operate free of charge on women victims of obstetric fistula in Madagascar. This pathology, caused by a childbirth that turned into a disaster, and which causes permanent and lifelong incontinence, has disappeared for a century in Europe. But not on the island, where the health system is a reflection of the dilapidation of the country. The United Nations has made May 23 the International Day for the Elimination of Obstetric Fistula.
These retired urological surgeons have spent a large part of their career in Africa, where they were upset by these abandoned women: this is why they decided to specialize in this very specific surgery. This condition, a consequence of a lack of obstetrical care, can be operated on, but it is very expensive: around 700 euros. More than a year and a half’s salary here, therefore inaccessible, not very profitable for Malagasy practitioners, little taught at university, and very little practiced.
“This operation is a resurrection because it completely changes lifeassures Dr. Ludovic Falandry, who regularly participates in these reconstruction missions.There are two healings: that of the surgeon, and social healing. The woman reintegrates into the village, can find a husband and have children again. That is real healing. Obstetric fistula is a social emergency. If we operate too late, when the village knows, well, we reject you.“
Susanna, one of these patients, was until then completely stigmatized. Like all these women, she experienced a psychological trauma by losing her baby during childbirth, before being the victim of a second sentence: that of being banished from her community, sometimes even from her family.
At 42, it has therefore been twenty years since she left her home. His tragedy: not having had the means to pay for the caesarean section offered by the public hospital. “With my husband, we did not have the requested money. So, we went home. But after three days of contractions, I couldn’t move. We went back to the hospital, but it was too late. It messed up my whole body. In the village, they call me ‘the lady who always pees’. Nobody wants to give me a job because of my handicap, my smell. My family cursed me and wished me dead“, she says.
Today, Suzanne and the 27 other women who benefited from these free operations last month are considered cured. But the need remains immense: we are talking about 5000 new victims of obstetric fistulas per year. The other goal of these repair campaigns is to train Malagasy doctors in this surgery, to democratize it. This is why in the block, the medical team is always mixed.