World Radio Day: Dr. Julia Musariri gives mothers and children a chance in Zimbabwe

(Vatican Radio) February 13th is World Radio Day, the theme this year focuses on the role of women in radio and in women's empowerment across the world.

The women journalists at Vatican Radio's English Section have always made a point of calling attention to the role of women in all sorts of issues and situations - often managing to give voice to women without a voice...

Linda Bordoni brings you the voice of an African woman, a missionary doctor who has done much - and continues to do so - to improve the lives of the people in her community...

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To celebrate World Radio Day this year I am going to bring you the voice of a woman who has inspired me profoundly…

Ins Julia… I am doctor Julia Musariri, I work at a Mission Hospital called St. Alberts in Centenary District of Zimbabwe…

My name is Linda Bordoni. In the 20 years I have been working here at Vatican Radio I have had the privilege and the opportunity of giving voice to many special women involved in – and committed to - important, often life-changing projects. But Dr. Julia Musariri – I think – represents them all: because of what she does, because of where she works, because of “why” she and her small staff do what they do…

Ins Julia… We went out and taught people about Aids and how it is contracted, what can be done for them and we strongly inform them on the prevention of the disease. Now with the pregnant mothers – all pregnant mothers are being tested for the HIV virus. Those who are found to be positive are already given anti-retroviral therapy for themselves and for their babies
Me: Can I ask you what percentage of mothers or pregnant women are found to be HIV positive?
Ins cont… the mothers who are found to be positive are 12% of the population, so from the 25% we were in the past years to 12% I think the work we have been doing has had results and we hope we will continue to have good results until we come to zero because our aim is to come to zero. T: 1’00”

The hospital doctor Musariri runs is St. Albert’s Mission Hospital in Northern Zimbabwe. It nestles in the bush on the edge of the Zambezi escarpment, and serves people in the surrounding villages and those in the Zambezi Valley. Both areas continue to grow as people migrate from cities to the rural areas because of Zimbabwe's devastating economic and political crisis…

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The little hospital struggles to respond to all the needs of the community. But HIV/Aids accounts for much of the work Dr Musariri and her small staff struggle through every day, as she says: raising awareness, fighting the stigma, getting people tested, treating them, caring for them and trying to set the foundations for the future of the children.
Yes, because Dr Musariri has seen huge results in the past 10 years in her efforts to halt the spread of the epidemic and give children a chance by doing something really simple: prevent mother to child transmission of the virus…

Ins… (me) Because treating a mother means giving a huge chance to the baby to be born without the HIV virus – am I correct? Yes, that is very correct. But also the mothers must do exactly what the health worker had told her to do, because we have seen babies who may turn positive because the mother has either stopped taking the drugs herself, or has stopped giving the baby her drugs, or has been breastfeeding and giving extra food in the first six months of life. Me: So there is a huge job to be in teaching the mothers also how to bring up their children and how to prevent an evolution of the disease… that is an on-going programme. Every time a mother comes to us, we go over all over again all the education we have given when she was pregnant, when she delivered, every time she comes back T: 1’01”

The bad news is what led me to interview Dr. Julia Musariri in the first place, and that is: her funds are running out. She came to the Radio whilst on a fund-raising tour for her forgotten community, because every time Dr Julia is unable to provide an HIV positive mother-to-be with anti-retroviral drugs, another child with no future is born in Zimbabwe…

Ins Julia: It’s extremely difficult to work without resources and especially when we deal with health and when we want to give quality care. What drives me to stay with my people is that they need me. I could easily stay in any developed country because I have the qualifications. Most of my colleagues have done so. They are in the UK, in America, Australia, in the surrounding South Africa, Namibia, Botswana and so on…because they get a better pay, and they are right, they need a comfortable life. But those people who haven’t got a dollar, they need someone to look after them and as St. Paul says: the charity of Christ urges me to stay with these people. So I will continue to work with this community, which has nothing to give to me in return but their smiles and their joy… T: 56”

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Thanks to Dr Musariri and her staff, the number of new infections among babies in her area has almost halved since St. Albert’s HIV mother-to-child-prevention programme was launched in 2001, and, “yes” I agree: that’s fantastic news….