Ethiopia
GHM in Ethiopia
A hundred people are lined up at the front gate, waiting to be treated. It’s a typical morning at Aira Hospital, a remote central Ethiopian mission hospital. Some of them have walked for hours or even days to Aira, a small town in western Ethiopia, to be treated by the dedicated staff. This hospital faithfully serves tens of thousands of patients per year, providing surgical services otherwise unavailable, with as many as 250 outpatient visits per day and 80 in-patient beds. All this is done with dated equipment that sometimes functions only with the assistance of jerry-rigging and prayers. Aira Hospital is one of only a few full-service hospitals between Khartoum and Addis Ababa.
GHM partners with the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus (EECMY) in support of Aira Hospital, Aira Midwifery and Nursing School, and several rural clinics in the region. To build their capacity, GHM offers scholarship support for nurses and midwives, plus small grants for capacity-building equipment and supplies purchased in Ethiopia.
Data from WHO, and The World Bank
Meet the Graduates
Fewer than half of births in Ethiopia are attended by a skilled birth attendant. Instead, many women deliver at home, relying on their mother or other women in their village for help during labor and delivery, and complications can be devastating. Maternal and infant mortality rates in Ethiopia are among the highest in the world. Graduates of Aira Midwifery and Nursing School want to change that. Many have known first-hand the loss of a sister, cousin, or neighbor during childbirth. GHM’s financial support of this nursing school in Western Ethiopia is helping increase the number of skilled nurses and midwives in a place where there are too few.
