The Dangers of Home Births in Pakistan

Dr. Shershah has campaigned tirelessly to raise maternal health awareness. When he is not conducting doctors workshops or training courses for midwives - hoping that one day they will be able to replace the traditional dais, women with no formal medical training who currently deliver the vast majority of babies in Pakistan - he is raising money for his pet project, a village hospital for poor women he built with his savings and contributions from family and friends. Treating patients without charge, Dr. Shersha's Kohigot Hospital was opened primarily to treat women with obstetric fistulas - a result of obstructed labor that renders the woman incontinent. The condition affects tens of thousands of women in Pakistan, largely poor women who, as a result of malnourishment, have underdeveloped skeletons. Left untreated, these women become social outcasts, rejected by their husbands and families. But fistulas can usually be repaired by relatively simple surgery. Dr. Shershah is one of the few gynecologists in the country who performs such operations. Maternal death is not a medical problem, it's a political one, Dr. Shershah says. Only when the political will is there will the women of Pakistan get the health care system they deserve.