Day 11

So today began our real experience with the medical students. Chris and I walked over to the main campus around 8am this morning and had a meeting with our group (14 med students) and Dr. Baboo, the head of the department of Community Medicine. We finally received a hard copy of our tentative schedule for the rest of the summer. The community medicine rotation is 8 weeks, week 1 was lectures; week 2 (this week) is a rural community health survey in Kafue (about an hour outside of Lusaka); week 3 is an urban health clinic survey in Lusaka; week 4 we will be staying in Livingstone (where Victoria Falls is) for the entire week doing school health surveys around the community; week 5 we will be conducting the lead poisoning survey in Kabwe (the focus of our case study); week 6 is the industrial medicine/occupational health unit where we will be going to local factories and job-sites including Chilanga Cement, the Padmodzi Hotel, Kafue Sugar Estates, and King Quality Meat Products; week 7 is the environmental health unit where we will be conducting surveys on sanitation and refuse disposal in various locations (including a sewage plant...should be interesting..); finally week 8 will be our wrap-up week where we will be writing our case study and presenting it to the students and faculty at the medical school. Sounds like an exciting summer!!

TODAY I GOT MY WHITE COAT FOR THE SUMMER! :) Seriously the white coat just makes everyone who wears it look so much more legit and amazing. I get to wear it pretty much everyday for the rest of the summer and it basically made my day when Chris and I got them today.

So after we received our fabulous white coats, one of the med students, Lou Pierre, we were shown around the med student's dorms, student center, lecture halls, and dining hall area. Then, all 16 of us loaded up on the bus and headed off to Kafue, about an hour outside of Lusaka. When we arrived at the Kafue Health Center, we found out that the head of the health department (who was supposed to come with us to the rural village) was still in a meeting and then needed to get lunch. So, we preceded to sit in the bus in the parking lot of the center for about 2 hours waiting for him...however, this was a great time to finally bond with a lot of the med students. I think I forgot to ever mention this, but EVERYONE speaks English SOOOOO well here!!! All of the lectures were in English and all writing everywhere around Zambia is in English (this might have to do with the fact that the British still claimed Zambia until the 60s...). Anyway, we sat in this parking lot talking and joking around for a few hours. It was a lot of fun and we definitely had some interesting conversations...some about witchcraft (which most people here COMPLETELY believe in!), polygamy (which is totally acceptable in life here...part of the reason why HIV/AIDS has become so predominant in sub-Saharan Africa), I remember some argument about renal failure, a huge discussion about malaria and how awful it is (most people here get it around 3 times a year! And while I am taking preventative medication for this whole trip, most of them have never taken it), and of course we talked about the nightlife. Many of them invited Chris and I to tag along with them any weekend when they hang out at the local clubs/bars, etc.  

After we finally picked up the head of the health department, we drove about 45min across the bumpiest rock/dirt road ever! As we began to drive further and further away from urban civilization, we ran across several straw huts and farms across the landscape. Speaking of the landscape, I really need to get a good picture of it because it is so strange! Basically it was high grasses on each side of the road with palm/coconut trees spread sporadically around and then some of those enormous trees with really fat trunks and really skinny branches..think the Tree of Life from the Animal Kingdom.

When we arrived at the next health center, we picked up another person and then drove off again, heading deeper into the rural fields for another 30min down the bumpy road (if you could even call it that).  Upon arrival to yet another health center, we sat in the bus for another half hour while the head of the health department guy went and talked to someone, and then everyone decided that we were done for the day...even though we hadn't even done one household survey yet and I think we were supposed to do 10 today...whoops haha. I took some pictures of the final health center and the area around it:

The thing in the middle is a water pump (probably one of the only for the whole village), behind it is a home with a straw fence.

This marked the first time I have ever seen a rural, poor community. It was really shocking in a bad way. It was just awful for me to realize what some people live like..in conditions that no human should have to suffer through. While we were in the bus we saw a malnourished, stunted child walk by..and though I have seen pictures of what these children look like, I had never actually seen it before. It was truly a sad sight and the entire drive back to Lusaka, Chris and I had a discussion on what we just saw, how to do something about it, what the government can do, etc. The med students even were saying how these people in the rural communities have nothing, poor access to healthcare and how sad it is. I have noticed that the med students are definitely well-off compared to the average Zambian. They all have Blackberries and touch-screen phones, are very educated, and most of them have said the main reason they want to become doctors is to make a lot of money (and most of them plan on leaving Zambia once they have their degree and go to the US or Europe to make more money and live in better conditions).

Well I should probably go to bed as I have to wake up a 6am tomorrow to meet up with the med students and head all the way back to the rural village we were at today...so goodnight!

Jenn