In Senegal, a mother’s ordeal exposes a health system under strain

Dakar, Senegal – Twenty-four hours before health workers across Senegal were due to walk out on strike, Awa Diba went into labour. Her first child was coming into the world as hospitals prepared to limit services to emergency care. Her husband and other relatives were absent. She shared a room with four other women. Cracks ran across the ceiling. The fan did not work. Some rooms had air conditioning; others did not. Electricity was intermittent. Women cried. Some were frightened. Sometimes, she says, their cries were met with: “Be quiet.” Diba entered the hospital as a trainee nurse and left as a mother, carrying a healthy daughter. The experience left her feeling that the system itself was unwell.