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Muslim View: Science in Current Events
The Realities of Motherhood in War-torn Afghanistan
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| Mothers and their children in
Afghanistan |
In
the middle and northern sectors of Afghanistan, annual December to April
blizzards - accompanied by 40 degrees below zero temperatures in the mountains -
can be merciless (Nasser p.7). Constantly fleeing from bombs, cold and hunger,
an Afghani mother can worry until she can becomes mentally exhausted. What,
then, will be the future of her children?
Administrator
of the United Nations Development Program Malloch Brown commented that Kabul has
long been a dangerous place for the ordinary Afghani. For many years he has
listened to 7-year old children express a desperate need for security even
before the time of the Taliban regime. As he leads a program to rebuild
Afghanistan, he states that this is not a new effort but simply a continuation
of old efforts on behalf of the U.N.
U.N.
humanitarian efforts go back to the former king. However, the new U.N. program
to rebuild Afghanistan is modeled on the one designed to provide relief for
Bosnia, where long-term traumatic effects were found amongst 75% of the
survivors (NCPTSD, p.1). In Afghanistan, most have fled to neighboring countries
or lay waiting on the borders with their homes in a suitcase (McCullogh, p.2).
Mothers are at the forefront of those suffering.
Dr.
Olivier Brasseur of the Population Fund observed that “Women who manage to
cross the border are totally exhausted. They come with children and no
resources. They suffer from anemia, from infection, and from starvation”
(McCullogh, p.3).” Currently, the U.N. seeks to raise an additional $4.5
million to provide basic “birthing kits” (worth $1 a piece) and other aid.
This order will attempt to provide each woman with a plastic sheeting to lie on,
a sterile razor blade to cut the cord and a string to tie the cord. The $4.5
million campaign also includes doctors and midwives who will assist Afghani
women in their healthcare needs. Much of the initial $4.5 million has been
pledged by Luxembourg, Japan, Netherlands and others; but the aid will only last
for six months once the pledges are honored because there are many health issues
for women beyond basic health care, razors and strings. In fact, it is estimated
that in the next year alone, approximately 20,000 women will need cesarean
sections or help with birth complications (McCullogh, p.1-3).
Furthermore,
even if the U.N. campaign is successful, it will not cover the Afghani’s that
have already fled the country. With the world’s spotlight on Pakistan, the
U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees has only allocated $5 million for the two
million refugees on the Iranian-Afghani border. The Iranian Red Crescent
supplies water and electricity from Makaki (a nearby village in Iran) to a
cluster of tents with small wooden fires. Safe but exhausted and anxious, the
only food the 5,000 refugees could break their Ramadan fast with was tea and
bread. Now there are 70,000 new arrivals and thousands outside the border
(Whitaker, p. 13).
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Are
Relief Efforts Really Close Enough to the Problem? |
Under
these circumstances, mothers experience altered psychological, hormonal and
immunological activity (NCPTSD, p.3). The unborn child becomes exposed to
nutritional deprivation – much like during the Dutch famine of 1945. The
result of that famine was that babies born to mothers who experienced starvation
during the 2nd and 3rd
trimester of pregnancy had an increased risk of manic depression (Stern, p.1).
Those children who were exposed to parental panic were at risk of becoming
dysfunctional, having lived through emotional distress. Mounting evidence, in
fact, has shown that children of parents with panic disorders also reflect this
disorder - as well as anxiety disorders. In addition, these children exhibit a
high rate of agoraphobia (a fear of public and open spaces). Social
phobia was also present amongst children whose parents were treated for major
depression (Huggins, p. 1-3). How many Afghani women will get the opportunity to
deal with these issues above and beyond their society which has now been blown
apart?
Even
with the U.N. calls for help, the situation worsens for Afghani women as other
help agencies evacuate their relief workers. The Afghani call for the
international community to stop the war goes unheeded. Growing resentment after
the Blu-82 bombing on Tora Bora has added to mounting civilian deaths causing
Medecins san Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) to evacuate its foreign staff
at the beginning of December 2001 (Nyiers, p.9) The Blu-82 can leave a 3-mile
long crater. It releases flammable ammonium nitrate, aluminum dust and
polystyrene slurry to detonate into a firestorm that destroys the internal
organs of all those nearby (Flanders, p.3).
Who
could believe, that Afghanistan once had an agricultural sector responsible for
50% of the country’s gross domestic product and 75% of its employment. Now, in
addition to the drought, 750 sq. kilometers of land are planted with mines
instead of crops and the people are starving (Nyiers, p.9).
The
rebuilding of Afghanistan this time around requires long-term serious commitment
and a reason to trust again. A society cannot function positively without the
healthy upbringing of its members -
physically and psychologically. But how can they do that when their homes, the
basis of all societies and all-important to the Muslim family, no longer exist.
What homes do they have to return to and what lies ahead in the neighboring
countries?
Sources:
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