The mother had carried her sick baby for two hours over steep, rutted roads. Now she could only stand by as the doctor sounded the child s chest. Pneumonia, said the doctor at last. There was nothing to be done, unless she could get the baby into hospital straight away. She was lucky.
Health care can be a hit or miss affair in the isolated hamlets of north-eastern.
I n a dark, nearly window-less concrete block house on the outskirts of Gaborone, a woman props herself up on one bony elbow and stares blankly at the camera. Her name is Dipuo and she is just 23 years old. She is HIV infected, the disease has entered its final stages and she has only a few weeks to live. Because they lack power, women suffer discrimination from early childhood and are too often the victims of domestic violence. In fact, men are more and more taking ownership of mobilization and advocacy for the emergence of a more gender equitable young man.