First Days in Botswana

Two hops by plane took me from Cape Town to Gaborone, the capital of Botswana. The lush green of the Cape peninsula ended at the mountain barrier past which is the Karoo – a semi-desert region reaching almost up to Johannesburg. The mountains still had some snow on the ridges which were shaded from the sun, and beyond them the brown scrub stretched to the horizon. Those of you have flown into Joburg will know how the goldmines have scarred the landscape.

I transferred onto a little propeller plane (a De Havilland Dash for those aircraft anoraks like me) and buzzed up towards Botswana. There is a green stretch of a game park just before the border, and then the red earth of Botswana lies below. The huge dam next to Gaborone looked pretty empty – this is the second drought year in Botswana. As the plane circled to land I was amazed to see the hyper-modern glass government buildings in the centre of the little city – I certainly had not expected them. The international airport is pretty small, and ours was the only plane there. Arriving there reminded me of touching down at little regional airports 20 years ago (and I mean that in a really nice way!). I picked up my hire car, drove into town, checked in to the hotel, and settled in.

The next three days were based at the Princess Marina, Botswana’s main hospital. The country is huge geographically, but with a small population – less than 2 million people. There are small regional hospitals, with more complex cases being referred to the Princess Marina.

The dietitians at the hospital has arranged a busy programme for me, and over the three days I gave several lectures, presentations and workshops, and spent time learning about how Botswana is coping with its HIV epidemic. More of that to come in later posts.

There are only 24 dietitians in the entire country, with 16 of these in Government service. Most of these work in Gaborone, with some doing outreach to distant clinics (flying in a little plane – a flying dietitian: my idea of a perfect job). There are no dietetic courses here, so everyone has to study abroad. I have to say that the dietitians here are wonderful – a fantastic team coping well with a huge workload. I spoke with the medical director at the hospital. Next year there will be the first intake of student doctors at the University of Botswana medical school. He agreed that in-country training of other health professionals should be the next step.