malaria fail

As many of you know I got malaria and have been in the hospital for the last couple days. When I got here I could barely walk and all I wanted to do was lay down in a dark and quiet room and sleep. Moving my head just a centimeter caused one of the worst pains I have ever felt.

Before that I had been shitting out water/soup and having a lot of nausea for almost a week. My headache started a couple days in but I didn't think anything about it because I thought it was just from the sun. Now it seems likely that it was a sign of dehydration from the diarrhea (I have been drinking 2 or 3 liters of water a day since getting here). I was also having cramps and vertigo. I knew that I was going to Leo in a few days though (the capital of the province) so I decided to wait and see the doctor there (none in the village, just a nurse that doesn't even know what the medications she prescribes actually are).

I saw a doctor the day I got to Leo. He thought I had typhoid fever but did not do any tests and prescribed me some very general antibiotics, some anti-diarrhea drink mix and anti-parasite medicine. I took this but then that night was when my headaches got really bad. So, I went back first thing the next day and saw a different doctor. I liked him better and he tested me for malaria, which came back negative (it was a false negative). He wanted to test me for infections and parasites but the machines needed to do that were out of order in Leo, so he said I had to go to Ouagadougou (the capital of Burkina) for more treatment. So, that's what I did. The next day I hopped on the bus with some people I know that work for BHM (Bridges of Hope Ministries, the organization I am with here). My head was killing me at this point and I could barely keep myself sitting up.

When we got to Ouaga Zachee and I (he does some work for BHM and takes care of us when there are problems) went straight to the medical center and I saw the doctor. He decided that my state was so severe that I had to be kept under observation (aka hospitalized) for a couple days. Neither of us had really expected this so we were a bit shocked. They did some tests and found out I had malaria, yeast infection (all we eat here is carbs) and an infection (that I still don't know the name of exactly, but I'm guessing salmonella or typhoid).

The room is really nice though. I have a big full bathroom (having a real toilet is the best thing in the world when you have diarrhea), air conditioning, screened-in windows, a double bed, a TV (that I haven't even watched yet) and best of all: free wifi. Having internet access has made this experience so much easier because I was able to talk to my dad, my friends, and catch up on a lot of the big news back home. Thanks facebook, you may not be so evil after all...maybe. Every time the doctors walk in here I'm on the computer. Sometimes I'll be talking to someone on Skype and I think some of them think I'm crazy and that I'm talking to myself because not many of them know a lot about computers.

Anyway I'm feeling a lot better now and other than my arm killing me from the IV I'm doing alright. I may be leaving tonight but apparently malaria treatment normally takes 5 days and I've only had 3 days worth, so I have to decide whether to leave and take the pill treatment which is less effective or stay and take the IV. On the one hand, I would love to get this IV out of my arm (just the thought of it being there makes me nauseated because of my fear of needles) and I would like to go enjoy Africa rather then waste away on this computer. However on the other hand I want to make sure that I am all better before I leave. I was having a lot of diarrhea yesterday and so they gave me Imodium to stop it. Consequently, I don't know if my diarrhea is actually gone today or if it's just because the Imodium hasn't worn off yet. I don't want to leave tonight only to find that tomorrow I'm back on the shitter. So I'm not sure what I'll do yet.

Seriously though, I feel awful for the people who die from malaria. From what I experienced, it must be a horribly long and painful death. That's the problem - malaria isn't that big of a deal if you can get treatment for it. I was pretty serious but after one day in the clinic I felt a million times better. The problem is that having this kind of care is costing me 25 000 FCFA (about 65 CAD) a day. To me, that is not that expensive because first of all it will likely be covered by my medical insurance but also because that's cheaper than what I would pay for a hotel room with the same amenities back home.

Obviously though most of the people here couldn't afford that. Sending them mosquito nets is not enough. I have taken my Malarone (anti-malaria pill) religiously, worn bug repellant and long sleeves at night, and I make sure that my bug net is thoroughly tucked in every night (but not just because of mosquitos...there are a lot of weird insects in Africa). Even with all of these precautions, I still got malaria. What these people really need is access to adequate healthcare. In the village's medical clinic, all they have is a nurse who quite frankly does not know when and what to prescribe to her patients. In order to do any tests or see a real doctor, you have to go to Leo. There however, the machines are sometimes broken and can't be fixed immediately. Also, I got my false negative there h0wever I cannot really comment on that since I don't know much about medicine and therefore can't judge if that was the lab's fault or something else. In any case I had to come to the capital in order to get proper treatment, and even then it was much too costly for the average Burkinabe. Adequate healthcare seems to be out of reach for them.

Education seems to be another key things that is needed here. There was a woman in the office in Leo who had an ankle swollen to twice the size of her other ankle. She should have kept it elevated, but she did not know to. In Boura they have weekly meetings with mothers and their malnourished babies. They weigh the kids, give them some UNICEF malnourishment food, and talk to the women about topics that can help them take better care of their children. One week, we talked about hygiene and diarrhea. When asked what caused diarrhea, one of the women answered that when a mother dies during childbirth and is subsequently burried, every kid in the village will get diarrhea. My host mom buys meet every market day (once every 6 days), cooks it, then keeps serving it until it's all eaten - even if it lasts for days. Of course, there is no electricity in Boura so it just sits on the shelf in a casserole pot. When I told her that you can get sick from doing that, she was shocked.

None of these people are to blame for their ignorance; no one told them before. Yet that's the problem, and it seems nearly impossible to fix. It's not just a matter of educating them on how they can get sick. They also need to have the resources to be able to act on this new knowledge. You can't ask my host family to stop eating meat just because they don't have electricity. Washing your hands will help get rid of germs that can cause diarrhea, but you need the soap and clean water to do that with. Furthermore, there are years of cultural habits that you cannot simply go in and say are wrong and replace them with new, Western ways. It's a slow process of education, adaptation, learning and mutual understanding. Some development is needed in order for them to have their basic needs met; adequate clean and nutritious food, clean water, access to education and access to healthcare.

That's what I thought before anyway. Now I'm considering other ones, including electricity. Maybe it's not so bad, especially since electricity usually means solar panels here. There is certainly no shortage of sun. Electricity would help a number of issues like providing medical care, proper storage of food, or even education. I had a talk to my host dad about the media one night and it's pros and cons. I told him about all the negative messages and mass advertising that we have to deal with in Canada, and we discussed the ways in which having a television in their home would help them learn many things that they are not exposed to in the village. Electricity was not something that I had thought of as necessary in achieving a lot of the things I hope developing countries will soon have before I got here, but after being here I realize that it is.

The problem is that solar panels are about 100 000 or 120 000 FCFA (over 250 CAD), far out of reach of most families here. Even my host family who is considered middle class cannot afford that (although I expect my host dad will save up and one day will get one). Plus, every three to five years or so the batteries need to be replaced, which cost about 30 000 FCFA (75 CAD). Plus the light bulbs, TV, fridge...the list goes on. It's not so simple.

Nothing is simple about development. I felt that way before I got here, but now that I can see and live it I feel like it's even more uncertain than before. This is exactly why I came here though; to see what it's really like so that I can base my opinions on real-life experience rather than just what I've read and learned in class. I don't think that I will be leaving here with any definite answers though, and I certainly didn't expect to, but it's just overwhelming and difficult to understand how I can legitimately help.