Thank you.
It would be ideal to have obstetricians and gynecologists in most of these countries, more than just the ones who usually exist. It's not realistic, unfortunately.
In our coalition, when we talk about skilled or trained health workers, we're talking about the same group of people pretty much, people who have gotten an education, have been through a formalized system that is recognized either nationally or by the WHO, and have the skills and the knowledge to be able to deal with either child mortalities or maternal mortalities.
When you're dealing with maternal mortalities, skilled and trained health workers could be doctors, nurses, or midwives. And in a lot of African countries what we're hearing more and more about now are what are called “health extension workers”. Ethiopia has them. Nigeria has them. I believe Mali has more of these people. These people are an extension of the health care system. They receive a year to two years of training, and then they're placed out in the communities. They usually come from the community, and they have been trained well enough to be able to provide promotive and preventive services to women. A lot of them may receive basic life-saving skills so that in the event of a pregnancy they would know how to deal with it and would be able to give drugs to help postpartum hemorrhage.
So we're talking about the same thing. We're talking about getting somebody out in that front-line position, living within the community or working within the community, somebody who's got a background of knowledge and skills and the ability and understanding to use medicines and drugs safely in order to accurately and appropriately prescribe medicines where needed or treatment where needed, and able to intervene in the case of death.