For the past five years, the Rotary Foundation has supported a pilot program in Nigeria aimed at reducing maternal morality by preventing and treating obstetric fistula, a serious birth injury that can cause stillbirth and, in the mother, chronic incontinence, infection, nerve damage and death. The primary cause is labor that goes on for too long, often for days. Because 70% of Nigerian women deliver at home, often without access to proper medical care, long labors that would be prevented in the developed world are more common. Prevention is the key and with the help of a Rotary Foundation grant, a series of radio programs were created that explained the condition, its causes and the available treatment. All in all, this project helped reduce maternal death by 60%; it reached 1 million women of childbearing age and resulted in the repair of obstetric fistulas for 1,500 women. (Lana Rouff, District Rotary Foundation Chair)
