MALAWI

MALAWI | 

A CULTURE OF SILENCE| 

Photo credit: Lorna Genoud, 2015

Malawi (118,480 km2) is home to 16 million Africans, in a country that is 1/8 the size of New South Wales (809, 444 km2), or of a similar size to Pennsylvania in the U.S.  

But- Malawi has 16 million people, the state of NSW has 7.5 million. MALAWI HAS DOUBLE THE PEOPLE LIVING IN AN EIGTH OF THE SIZE.

Almost half the countries entire population are CHILDREN, 6.8 million children. Just over 500,000 children have lost one or both parents. Life expectancy is 51.4 for females- can you imagine? My Mum is 56, my Aunt 59 and my Grandmother 79- by these projections, if I were born in Malawi, these three people in my life would now be dead and I would have already lived half of my life span. 

For every 100,000 live births in Malawi, 675 mothers will die as result of pregnancy and childbirth related causes, an improvement from 807 in 2006. Diseases such as Malaria and HIV, poor nutrition and poverty contribute to one of the wordless highest maternal mortality rates. Malawi was hoped to reach the MDG 5 target, 155 material deaths per 100,000 by 2015- though this is unlikely. HIV is a leading cause of death, yet only 55 per cent of men and women know the three ways of preventing infection (fidelity, condom use and abstinence). A CULTURE OF SILENCE denies people access to correct information. We sit and wonder why HIV spreads and kills so fast in these countries- yet so many lack the understanding of what it is or how to prevent it.

Globally, 39,000 children will become BRIDES EACH DAY. Malawi’s child marriage rates are among the highest in the world, with one out of two girls married before they turn 18 (watch a documentary here). Parents and guardians arrange most child marriages in Malawi.   However, Malawi is taking important steps to change this. A new Malawi law that sets 18 as the minimum age for marriage is an important step toward preventing child marriage. The Marriage, Divorce and Family Relations Act (Marriage Act) of 2015 became law earlier this year, though, under Malawi’s constitution, girls and boys ages 15 to 18 may be married with parental consent. The constitution also does not specifically prohibit the marriage of children under 15, but merely directs the government to “discourage” such marriages. Nineteen-year-old Elina V. was 15 and in school when her grandmother forced her to marry a 24-year-old man. “I had to look after my husband, do housework, deal with in-laws, and work on the farm,” she said. “My worst time was when I was pregnant. I had to do all this and deal with a pregnancy while I was just a child myself.”

"They dream about being doctors, they dream about being pilots, but the environment that they live in does not always enable those dreams to come true". 

Are you feeling grateful? You should. Are you feeling guilty? You shouldn't. We cannot change where we are born. But we can change what happens when we are. You should continue to read, learn and educate yourself. Commit to it, because it is people who change the world. 

#tendaystotellme #tellmeaboutmalawi