Introduction to the health status and conditions at Daoming Primary Schools
Dao Zhengquan is just 30 years old and is already the father of 3 children. He is the only one in his family able to do the hard work that a farmer must do every day to cultivate his own land. In the oxcart is the corn he has collected from the fields. These golden grains are one of the very few crops that can be planted in this land, and is also critical in feeding the whole family.
Dao Zhengquan grew up here and had to drop out from primary school because of family constrains of farming. He has married twice, but did not receive any marriage certificate. The first wife abandoned him because she could not bear the poverty conditions. In order to feed his family, several years ago, he left the mountains and went to Wenzhou to find work, but he suffered a serious injury to his leg, so he came back to the village to recover.
"I didn't go to a hospital. I just used some herbs that my mother collected in the mountains. Afterwards I was all right" When Dao Zhengquan is saying this, a faint smile comes out of his dark face as if this was a very unusual thing that he can feel proud of. After being injured on the job and coming back to recover, Dao Zhengquan hasn't go out to look for a job. "My parents are old. Farming work and me are inseparable".
During our conversation with him, we could also understand that his parent's health is not good. They are ofthen in pain, but they still work in the fields every day, looking after the cows, cutting grass. Although their fields are very small, there is still a miriad of work that needs to be done. It never crosses their minds the idea of going to a hospital if you are sick.
The same thing happened to Tau Zhengquan's daughter, Tau Honyan. Tau Hongyan is a 2 year of Primary student, and, as most girls here, has brown sugar colored skin and a clear smile. When we visited her home, she had fever for a day, curled up in the old sofa looking feebly at her grandmother's legs, smiling slightly while we were in conversation with her father. Her eyes were sligthly curious, a little excited, but I did not see any unhappiness caused by pain.
When our conversation was coming to an end, we raised the problem of Tau Hongyan's fever. Unexpectedly, her family did not show any surprise. They only nodded while smiling slightly, and their smile was telling us they felt sorry for the inconvenience Tau Hongyan's fever was bringing us. "No problem. She only needs to sleep well and she will be ok", the grandmother looked kindly at her granddaughter on her knees, her big rough hands stroking Tau Hongyan's forehead, strands of sweat soaked hair falling at both sides of her face.
This kind of answer got us by surprise. After all, common knowledge tells us how dangerous high fever is for children. Even if you don't go to a hospital, at least you have to take medicines to combat the fever, but the villagers here, unfortunately, they show no concern about this common knowledge, or they are unable to do anything about it.
In the short space of time of 20 days, children with fever, cases of chickenpox and sprains were common. But, whenever we contacted the parents, they always said they were busy working in the fields and that we would talk after they come back at night. It was later that we learned that these children are never taken to a hospital because of illness or injuries. As a last resort, they go to a local "doctor" and take some medicines for their children. And, when we were carrying on our backs our feverish child to see the so called "doctor", we were told he was still working in the fields and would only come back at night....
Villagers here mostly rely on self cure when they are sick. If a child get sick, the only thing they can do is to stay at home. It is like leaving the children to fend for themselves.
In fact, some of the villagers have been able to get the residence certificate in recent years, a few also pay health insurance, but the concept of medical treatment is still very weak. A lot of the people are still limited by the work at the fields, by economic constrains and even by geographical difficulties. There is a lot of resistance to go down the mountains to go to a hospital, even more when there is a great number of people (especially the old people and the ones exciding the only child policy) that, because they haven't any residence certificate, they can not enjoy any kind of health insurance.
They are used to the life of the "Forgotten people". For this people it is very difficult to accept the contact with the outside world. Tackling the problem of Hukou (residence certificate) and further implementing solutions to the health and medical problems, are still a long way to go.
While in the cities the doctor - patient relationship is becoming increasingly violent, and the cries of "difficult" and "expensive" and other related problems point the finger of blame at the hospitals, sadly we find that in the mountains the doctor - patient relationship is far from established. The village people lack general knowledge about medical care: unclean water is drank, some fruits cause a day of pain for the children, even some people have died because they ate rats. Health is the thing that we overlook more easily. Fortunately, we have a good health care system that remind us of the importance of health while we are in the hospital bed. But the villagers do not have such an opportunity. All they can do is to sleep and quietly wait for whatever fate bring them.