At Diah Clinic in Liberia, when a woman enters labour, the midwife’s first task is not to check the baby's heartbeat or take a blood pressure reading. It’s to walk to the pond and carry water back to the ward. Without it, nothing else is possible.
For Shanette Khauala, a midwife who has worked at the clinic for three years, those minutes can be critical. If a woman arrives in active labour, she explains, the time it takes to find water can mean she is left unattended at the most dangerous point of delivery.
