Children's Day

Last Wednesday (November 14^th) we celebrated Children’s Day in a nearby village named Dhumpur. We set up a health fair and had lots of fun activities. This was much different than the health fairs I’m used to – no brochures and pamphlets even distributed! The village has only a 17% literacy rate, so written materials are not very helpful. When we first got to the village the children lined up in two single-file lines while one of the supervisors taught them their chants. They were chanting about children’s rights. Things like, “Right to Education, Right to Immunization, Right against Polio, Right against Child Labor…” and so on. Of course this was all in Bengali so we needed some translations in order to understand. I was helping to tape the thin paper signs to bamboo sticks so that the children could hold them. We marched with the children through a few nearby villages.

There were a few health officials there from the government that spoke about different health and hygiene topics. Each mother brought the child’s immunization record and all records were reviewed by health workers to determine which children had received all the vaccines they needed at the appropriate times. Incentive prizes were given for the best immunized children. A doctor was also there and free medical check-ups were offered for all the women and children present. Medicines were also provided in very small amounts after the check-up.

Lastly, there was a “quiz competition” for the mothers. Questions regarding health and immunization were asked to the crowd. Those who answered correctly were given a bar of soap and a small pouch of laundry soap as prizes. This is a great way to check their knowledge and awareness about different health issues as well as evaluate the effectiveness of previous interventions. Again, because of the low literacy rate, written tests or surveys are not very helpful. Two very important things were determined through the quiz competition: 1. Their knowledge about immunization was very good. They knew which vaccines were to be given at which times. 2. No one had any knowledge or understanding of HIV/AIDS! Thank goodness for our next HIV program that just got passed! :)