Women's Care Group

The Women's Care Group officially began the 6th of November. This is the program in which there are 10 female village volunteers that meet with my counterparts and I bi-weekly to discuss a health topic and do theater and/or activities related to the topic. Each women is then in charge of sharing that information with the 10 households nearest to her compound. The idea is that all three villages involved will receive 100% coverage and slowly, slowly, health knowledge will begin to sink in and behavior change will start to take place.



The kickoff had its ups and downs. The volunteers were wonderful, but there was some drama between my dad and counterpart and unfortunately my dad very inappropriately brought it up and argued loudly in front of everyone for quite some time, putting a damper on everything. He continued to bring it up throughout the meeting, infuriating me.

After issues were put aside, we talked about flu prevention, how to avoid giving everyone the flu once you have it, and how to get rid of the flu. The women were all very interactive, even in front of the village chiefs, religious leaders and health committee members present. It assured me that they were the right women for the job. They asked questions, answered questions and acted out skits without embarrassment. The kickoff ended with drinks, each woman receiving a uniform and visual aids, and then we had a tam-tam, which is a drum and dance circle.



Since then, my dad and I have thankfully resolved all of our issues and the Care Group has gone house to house with flu information. We had our second meeting last week. This time diarrhea was the topic. The women were even more wonderful and with only the volunteers and my counterparts it was much more like a comfortable family setting. I am really excited about this project and the possible outcomes. I have to remind myself that behavior change takes time and nothing happens fast in Senegal. It's likely I will never see the results, but hopefully something good will come of it.