Urgent action needed for Wanaka mothers
Amazing how numbers stack up and the greater the number, the more amazing. Like realising that at any one time more than 500 New Zealanders have celebrated their 100th birthday and are looking forward to their next cake and candles event, possibly their 105th.
So we are living a long time, some of us.
But perhaps less cheerfully, every year here are 30,000 deaths in New Zealand, which is like the population of Timaru being cleared out or, say, one in every three Southlanders – and that’s every year.
Our natural birth rate won’t cut it.
It seems Southland will now need an extra 10,000 people just to keep our place in the scheme of things, to enable us to remain a viable, productive, living, working centre with health, education and welfare needs met, wealth accrued, family lines established, visitors welcomed, conservation considered, our place in the sun assured.
It seems ours is a shrinking gene pool and we must look further afield.
Sue Morrison Bailey’s contracts with Venture Southland have always led her to paving the way for migrants and refugees many of whom are quietly absorbed now.
But she says we do need to accept that more people will be needed to boost our still dwindling numbers and accepting, welcoming. these newcomers is a big part of the deal.
In the past immigrants have had to shift for themselves, forming a Scottish society, a Dutch club, a Welsh choir or a multi cultural council – mostly with little outside support.
Ms Morrison Bailey says the warmth of real acceptance is what helps people settle and that ought to come from us, the host group.
But it is not always forthcoming, easy or automatic.
Southland businesses seeking help to develop policies of fairness in diversity can learn from The Awareness Project a company set up by two young Southland women, Anne Kirkwood and Kate Wilkinson, to help build awareness of inclusion – gender or ethnicity – through seminars.
Sometimes we are surprised that we need to be taught how to behave, how to be kind, hospitable and fair.
But the thing is, often we are not any of these things.
We are fine with people we went to school with, shop with, had children with; but people with an unknown background, a different way of speaking and an unfamiliar appearance – they are something else again.
Too many of us still expect everyone to look like Aunty Maud and sound like Uncle Mac.
The Wanaka community currently faces a maternity crisis Local mothers are stressed and anxious, with some even saying they’re afraid to get pregnant at the moment because the services just aren’t there to support them.
The town’s one full-time midwife, and two locums, are being run off their feet attempting to meet the needs of a population of around 6000.
This coupled with the fact that there is no birthing unit in Wanaka and a massive four-hour drive to the nearest base hospital means there is a disaster waiting to happen in this town.
I believe that both the Health Minister and the Southern District Health Board are failing this community.
The Southern DHB will argue that they have fast-tracked the establishment of a Mother and Child Hub in Wanaka, which was announced last month following a two-year review of maternity services across the Southern region.
What they fail to mention is that a hub is not a birthing facility, but just a building where mothers can meet during the day.
And that 47 of the 216 submissions received to their recently released primary maternity plan, pointed out that a birthing unit was essential for Wanaka, while over half expressed concern about safety risks to women, babies and the community with increased travel and time.
What’s even more astounding is that statistics included in the DHB’s own Southern DHB Primary 1. What long-established New Zealand secondary school has the initials CBHS?
2. In what Pacific country would you find the Owen Stanley Range, scene of fierce fighting during World War II?
3. Firedamp is a hazard in what type of workplace?
4. In the United States, what are the names Attica, Sing Sing, Leavenworth and Rikers Island associated with?
5. Who was the subject of the 2012 sports autobiography The Fastest Man Alive? Maternity Report, of May 2017, show that Central Otago and Queenstown are the only two areas across the entire Southern region that are expected to have an increase in births.
The Statistics NZ figures show that the number of birth age women in Central Otago and Queenstown is set to increase, between 2018 and 2043, resulting in a projected 17-18 per cent rise in live births.
Significantly all other local authority areas are projected to have a decrease in birth age women, including Gore, Clutha and Winton, which all currently have full birthing units.
The Southern DHB and the Government are fully cognisant of this information and yet they have chosen to ignore it, despite the population projections being fundamental in deciding where primary maternity facilities should be located to best serve the needs of the population.
In the meantime the Health Minister has managed to skirt around this maternity crisis by saying that funding in this year’s budget meets midwives needs.
But the reality is that the budget funding increase for midwives, announced by David Clark in May, fell well short of expectations with organisations like the NZ College of Midwives saying the money would not address the income issues they faced.
Instead they referred to a funding co-design process, set up by the National Government last year, which provided a new payment system for 6. Jack Ryan, the CIA agent played in films by Harrison Ford, Alec Baldwin and Ben Affleck, was created by what novelist?
7. In the 2018 sci-fi movie The Meg, what type of creature does the title refer to?
8. In what American city would you find Columbia University?
9. The Japanese-owned company Juken Nissho is a major New Zealand processor of what commodity?
10. Which was the most popular name in New Zealand last year for female dogs: Poppy, Bella or Coco? ’’For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?’’ Esther 4:14 midwives to fairly reflect the job that midwives do and put community midwives income at $241,000.
It was the current Government, and the Health Minister, who didn’t recognise the completion of this process, which was finalised back in December 2017 and they have continued to fail to make any attempt to address pay equity for community midwives thus far.
In fact the Health Minister was provided with this information five months prior to this year’s Budget, but he chose to ignore it.
I am shocked at the duplicity shown here by Mr Clark and I am disappointed that the work undertaken by National to address midwives remuneration concerns has effectively been ignored.
This is ironic considering Labour were very vocal about improving maternity services when they were opposition, saying that health and midwives would be funded properly if they were elected.
For my part I have supported the Wanaka community in their fight, assisting in putting together a petition asking for improved maternity services and a full birthing unit in the town. I presented their petition with over 3800 signatures in May and it is now before the Health Select Committee and I have asked them to consider it with urgency.
I have also issued over a dozen media releases this year. I arranged for the Southern District Health Board’s executive director, strategy, primary and community Lisa Gestro to meet with concerned mothers in Wanaka.
Last month I met again with midwives in the town and from that meeting wrote urgent letters to both the DHB and the Health Minister.
I believe this issue comes down to funding and the Government’s failure to invest in health in the regions. In fact despite the Southern DHB lauding its new maternity plan last month, which they said would bring about major benefits for maternity services in the South, no extra funding was made available.
The serious risks faced by Wanaka mothers and their babies remain the same and urgent action is required.
❚ Jacqui Dean is the MP for Waitaki Anyone wishing to make a complaint to the New Zealand Media Council should first put it in writing to the editor. If not satisfied with the reply, complainants should then write to The Secretary, New Zealand Media Council, Box 10 879, Wellington, including a clipping of the disputed article and copies of the correspondence. Letters are welcome, but writers must provide their name, address and telephone number as a sign of good faith – pseudonyms are not acceptable. So that as many letters as possible can be published, each letter should be no more than 250 words. We reserve the right to edit letters for length, sense, legal reasons and on grounds of good taste. Please send your letters to: The Editor, The Southland Times, PO Box 805, Invercargill; fax on (03) 214 9905; or email to letters@stl.co.nz
‘‘. . . the fact that there is no birthing unit in Wanaka and a massive four-hour drive to the nearest base hospital means there is a disaster waiting to happen in this town.’’