Zambian Journalist On Trial for “Obscene” Childbirth Photos
In Zambia, the health workers are on strike. That’s not good for the people.
In response, journalist Chansa Kabwela sent two pictures of a woman giving breech birth to women’s rights groups, Zambia’s vice president, and health groups. They were graphic, so much so that Zambia’s The Post decided they were too obscene to publish.
But Kabwela was using these photos as an urgent message: End the strike! The woman had been turned away from two clinics where nurses were on strike, Her breech baby, seen in the photo, suffocated during childbirth. From the BBC:
The pictures are graphic. They show a woman in the process of giving birth to a baby in the breech position - when the baby’s legs come out first.
Its shoulders, legs and arms are visible, but the head has not yet been delivered.
This death apparently occurred outside the main hospital of the capital city, Lusaka. Doctors didn’t reach the laboring woman in time to save the baby.
