NEW LIFE AND NEW REGULATIONS IN THE TIME OF CORONA
WRITTEN BY RIHAM EZZALDEEN & PHILIPPA YOUNG
The waiting room of the Greek hospital where Riham helped translate for Zahra (Photo: Riham Ezzaldeen)
My name is Riham, I grew up in Damascus, Syria. I have been living in Europe for five years, and I’m currently in Greece, quarantined here for the foreseeable future. I am the Branded and Original Content Producer for WTYSL. While quarantined in Athens I wanted to volunteer. I know that I have ‘tools’ that can be beneficial to vulnerable people, so I am taking advantage of the languages that I speak (English and Arabic), and the fact that I have an awareness of human rights.
Zahra is from Aleppo. She is 23, shy, very quiet and rarely complains. Which is why, at 9 months pregnant and with gestational diabetes, it was her mother who noticed that things weren’t looking quite right with her daughter. Zahra, her husband and mother rushed to the public hospital in Athens, which is where I met them, to translate information between them and the doctors.
But how did I get to be in such a position? When corona virus put us all in lockdown, I asked around friends involved in the volunteer community in Athens. I shared with them a brief about what I can do and when, and asked that my number was passed on to any person who might need it.
The brief was as follows: I speak Arabic, I have access to a car, and I am ready to help. I soon got a call that there was a pregnant woman going to hospital with no Greek or English-speaker to accompany her.
In Greek public hospitals the woman is not allowed to choose who will be with her as she delivers her baby. No-one else can be in there with her. Only the doctors, nurses and midwife from the hospital itself are allowed in the delivery room. We live in different times now, and the new corona-time regulations have changed even this already outdated fact. Now, Zahra’s husband and mother could not even enter the hospital. As her translator I was the only one allowed to accompany Zahra inside the hospital.
Zahra had complications with her pregnancy and it was decided to observe her in a separate room. Here’s how the conversation went:
Hospital: We are taking Zahra into the observation room - you cannot go in with her.
Me: How will you communicate with her?
Hospital: We do not need to communicate with her. If we see that she needs a C-section we will take her there, and we will tell you when the baby is here.
Me: How are you going to take her consent for a C-section if you can’t communicate with her?
Hospital: *thinks for a while* Then we will have to get consent from her now in the eventuality that she needs a C-section.
I spoke to Zahra, telling her “you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, and if you feel like you’re being forced - ask for me.” I didn’t have much faith that she would. Zahra is so young, so shy, so unlikely to complain. I could see that Zahra was doing everything she could to understand. Reading people’s gestures and eyes. She would look straight deep in their eyes, trying to read the slightest signal. Is there a problem? Is my baby okay?
In Greek public hospitals the woman is not allowed to choose who will be with her as she delivers her baby. No-one else can be in there with her. New corona-time regulations have changed even this already outdated fact. Now, Zahra’s husband and mother could not even enter the hospital. (Photo: Riham Ezzaldeen)
After the observation room things happened very quickly. Zahra was wheeled out. She looked scared, already hooked up to an intravenous drip. I tried to speak with her but was told to be quiet by the two men rolling her towards the operating room. Running behind them I managed to check that Zahra knew what was happening, I told her that she would be okay, and that this was all going to work out.
It was just 35 minutes before I heard a nurse shouting a name that sounded familiar. It was the last name of Zahra’s husband. I jumped up and waved at her. The nurse was wheeling what looked like an empty crib. When I answered her call, she moved a tiny piece of cloth aside, and there was a baby - a real live, moving baby! I had seen this fresh new life before anyone else, before the father, the grandmother, possibly even the mother. So I quickly took a couple of photos, checked to see if Zahra was going to be okay - she was - and then ran outside to show the photos to the father and grandmother. A new life had successfully made its way into this crazy world! Everyone was crying and so happy.
Back inside the hospital there were more frustrations - a lack of beds, the baby in a separate nursery, kept away from Zahra for half a day - but there were worse cases with some women unable to see their babies for days. In these crisis stretched times, every bed is needed and hospitals are stretched to their limits. Now they are sleeping in the same room. The baby’s name is Zaki.
Reflecting on this long, frustrating day I have a multilayered feelings - did I do the right thing? There was one person allowed in the hospital with her. I was that one person. Should that person have been her mother, even if they wouldn’t have been able to communicate with the doctors? These situations are rarely clear, but I left knowing that I had done the best I could have done to make Zahra laugh, keep her calm, and ensure that she had all the information she needed.
To support others in a time of crisis you need to have compassion and kindness and softness, combined with force and demand and fire. You need to know where to direct these different energies, and sometimes you have to use them together at the same time. It’s like a war zone. You have to turn to the wounded and reassure them, but then turn away and tell someone else that this person might not make it. You need to have different facial expressions depending on who you are facing.
In this time of crisis, there are heightened frustrations and the rights of vulnerable populations are further compromised by being excluded from discussions around new regulations. The effect of this can be devastating for human beings, old, young, and freshly made. If you would like to get involved in supporting others there are many ways for you to have a positive impact. You can cook, or deliver food, you can care for older people, you can translate. It is very easy to step up now, in this time of crisis, as the doors are wide open. I believe it is now that people can find a place for their skills. Perhaps it is time to take another look at how you can be involved.