Zonta International District 29
Advancing the Status of
Women Worldwide
Thank you to Catherine Hamlin
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Honorary Zontian Catherine Hamlin wins ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’
Dr Catherine Hamlin has received the 2009 Right Livelihood Award "for her fifty years dedicated to treating obstetric fistula patients, thereby restoring the health, hope and dignity of thousands of Africa's poorest women"1. The Award includes a cash donation of EUR 50,000.
Dr
Hamlin was made an Honorary Zontian in 1996. The SafeHands for Mothers film
‘Fistula Pilgrims’, shown at the District 29 Conference in Tours, featured
Dr Hamlin and her Fistula Hospital in Ethiopia. On Sunday morning, Susanne
von Bassewitz, District Foundation Ambassador, during her presentation on
the Zonta International Foundation service project in Liberia, also gave us
more insight into Dr Hamlin’s reasons for opening the hospital in Addis
Ababa. Susanne quoted from Dr Hamiln’s book ‘The hospital by the River’, in
which Zonta International’s donation to the hospital was graciously
acknowledged.
It was during 1959 that Catherine Hamlin came with her husband Reginald to Ethiopia from Australia. They were shocked by what they saw. Experienced obstetricians and gynaecologists they knew about obstetric fistula but had never seen one. This condition occurs in developing countries but has been more or less eliminated in industrialised ones.
Women are treated free of charge at the hospital built by Dr Hamlin and her husband in 1974, and where they pioneered a surgical treatment which now has a success rate of 93%. As the hospital’s reputation spread, women travelled long distances in search of a cure. Today regional centres have been established making treatment more accessible, and to prevent the condition happening in the first place a midwifery school provides specialist training.
2,750 women are operated on every year bringing the total
treated to over 32,000 women.
More information on Dr Hamlin can be found by following the links:
http://www.rightlivelihood.org/hamlin.html
You can also view an
excellent film made on behalf of the Fistula Foundation by Engel
Entertainment by scrolling down to the bottom of the Right Livelihood Home
page. It is well worth watching.
The Right Livelihood Award was founded in 1980 and Awards are presented annually in the Swedish Parliament and are often referred to as 'Alternative Nobel Prizes'. They were introduced "to honour and support those offering practical and exemplary answers to the most urgent challenges facing us today".
References
www.rightlivelihood.org