South Africa (SFH) Program Links - 1 3292
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South Africa: Community Health
Program Excursions
Durban Hospices
Students are divided up into small groups and are transported to hospices in townships around Durban. They ask questions to health workers and see how a hospice operates. They see abject poverty and question the logic of curing ailments when patients are so poor and ill they cannot feed themselves adequately. Nurses tell of HIV positive patients who stop taking ARVs so as to maintain CD4 counts low enough to qualify for disability pensions.
Special Needs Schools
Apartheid Government set up a number of these schools for whites only. Most of these have now transformed into multiracial schools, but there are not enough of them. The current government wants to move towards inclusion, closing specialized schools and having students attend regular schools. Students see how much effort and manpower is required to educate those with needs, and are encouraged to consider the cost-benefit of special education. For comparison, students also visit a regular school.
The Valley Trust
This NGO was set up to assist communities in developing healthier environments for themselves, a pioneer in Primary Health Care. Students hear the story of how Dr Halley Stott founded the organization, which continues to be at the forefront of community-driven health intervention development and implementation.
Community Health Worker Home Visit
Students spend 3 nights and 2 days with a community health worker at Amatikulu. They attend lectures given by Health Worker trainers, and compare policy with practice. The effects of poverty and chronic illnesses on rural South Africans are starkly apparent, and students see the benefits and limitations of using community workers to administer prevention and basic treatment programs. The government-run Amatikulu Primary Health Training Centre emphasizes education and self-help. This is compared to NGO initiatives that use CHWs to provide first aid, assist with deliveries and provide home-based care for chronic patients.Dukuduku Forest Nursery for Traditional Plants
Students travel to Mfolozi and Dukuduku to visit conservation areas that preserve the biodiversity from which traditional cures are extracted. They see the effects of uncontrolled harvesting of plants, and hear about the efforts of the nursery to propagate rare and endangered plants. They also spend a day in the Mfolozi game park where the white rhinoceros (ubhejane – also the name of an unproven traditional cure for HIV) was saved from extinction and is now abundant. Students discuss issues around access and conservation of bioresources.