PBS A Walk to Beautiful documentary: Fistula victims in Ethiopia

In Ethiopia (and many developing countries), girls carry water and wood as soon as they learn to walk.  Coupled with malnutrition, they grow up tiny.  Many are married off young-- ten, eleven, sometimes even eight years old.  They get pregnant and when they deliver (without ob-gyns* or even qualified midwives), complications arise because the babies are too big for the mothers' tiny bodies.  Fistulas often result and the women become incontinent (urine and/or feces).

It gets worse.  Without treatment, the young women are ostracized.  They cannot work or even socialize.  Husbands leave them.  The "lucky" ones get to stay in makeshift, glorified doghouses on their family's property, as outcasts.

This is a story about a hospital in Addis Ababa that helps these woman.  Below is the trailer and you can watch the whole documentary here (52 minutes) or on Netflix Watch Instantly.

There are billions of people in need and a million worthy causes.  But this is definitely something that caught my attention.

*Ethiopia has a population of 77 million and it only has 160-odd ob-gyns.