Finnish doctor living amidst AIDS epidemic in Tanzania

Leena Pasanen has worked in Tanzania for almost 30 years

Leena Pasanen

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By Tuomas Kokko
     
      ”Have you been screened for AIDS?”
      This is a question that Finnish physician Leena Pasanen, 61, is used to asking every one of her patients first.
      It does not matter whether the patient has come to see Dr. Pasanen because of a sore throat or a broken leg. She has to know whether or not the person in front of her has been tested for AIDS.
      ”The result of the test has a direct influence on the cure and medication to be used”, Pasanen explains.
     
Pasanen works as a pediatrician in Tanzania in Eastern Africa.
      She uses the expression ”a bush hospital” of her workplace, the Ilembula Hospital.
      In this hospital, there are no sliding doors, no snow-white walls, just blotchy cement. Occasionally the water or electricity supply is cut off.
      ”I have noticed that always after returning from a long vacation I am horrified at the primitiveness and the number of flies buzzing there”, she remarks.
     
HIV infections and AIDS are a nationwide problem in Tanzania.
      About one-fifth of the population in the area of the Ilembula hospital are HIV positive, in other words they are at risk from getting AIDS.
      ”In practice, I run into AIDS every day, as around 50 out of the 300 beds in our hospital are occupied by AIDS patients who are in poor shape”, Pasanen notes drily.
      Pasanen has seen AIDS spreading from the sporadic cases of the early 1980s, reaching more and more people, and becoming an endemic nationwide problem.
      ”Certainly, there is not a single family in the country who would not know someone who has died of or been infected by AIDS. Then again, the fact that people have to encounter AIDS repeatedly could also help us to solve the problem”, says Pasanen.
     
But how is it possible that AIDS has exploded into an national epidemic? Pasanen is not able to give any explicit answer to this question.
      She thinks that it is a consequence of ignorance and indifference.
      ”One reason is people’s illusion of their own immortality. In the Western countries, people smoke, even though they all know its harmful effects on their health. Nobody believes that complications could hit them”, Pasanen argues.
      Today, the state of Tanzania is making efforts to curb the epidemic by arranging instruction for young people.
      ”Many beliefs and taboo should be eradicated, but it happens very slowly”, Pasanen says.
     
Pasanen is speaking about AIDS and the fates she has witnessed in a calm and quiet tone of voice, the way only doctors can.
      She believes that she is carrying out her vocation in Tanzania.
      Pasanen found her job through the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission in 1981.
      ”Suddenly, at the age of 32, I just realised that the purpose of my life as a Christian and a physician was to go to Africa. It certainly came as a big surprise to all my close relatives and friends”, Pasanen recalls.
      Pasanen took courses in tropical diseases and learned how to speak Swahili, which is the most widely used language in Tanzania.
      ”For four months I studied from morning till night. Then I just had to keep a straight face when I tried to speak clumsy Swahili to the mothers of my patients, as they did not speak English”, Pasanen says.
     
Following the AIDS epicemic, many children have been orphaned in Tanzania.
      Pasanen herself has become the legal guardian of four children.
      Two of the children were orphaned when their parents died of AIDS, the third was abandoned in an outhouse after birth, and the parents of the fourth were not able to take care of their child.
      ”I will be responsible for their lives and education, but I do not live with them. I want them to become Tanzanian nationals”, Pasanen says.
     
”Even though I have lived in the country for almost 30 years, I still regard myself as a Finn. In Tanzania, I am just an outside observer”, Pasanen feels.
     
     
Leena Pasanen was chosen as Ex-Pat Finn of the Year in 2009.
      She was born in 1949 in Iisalmi, and spent her childhood in Oulu, where she also studied medicine.
      After practicing pediatric medicine for six years in Finland, she left for a calling in a rural hospital in Tanzania, where she has been based ever since.
      Pasanen has written a book about her work, entitled Daktarin lapset ("Daktari's Children"). It was selected as the Christian Book of the Year in Finland in 2000.
      World Aids Day is marked on December 1st each year.
     
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 2.12.2010


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Finnish police officer is adoptive father of six Rwandan orphans (16.11.2010)
  Red Cross worker Maritta Vuori helps flood victims in Pakistan (26.8.2010)
  Finnish schoolchildren to donate day´s work to help Tanzania fight AIDS (12.9.2005)

Links:
  World AIDS Day, Dec. 1st
  Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission - AIDS Day
  The Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission
  World Health Organization: Leena Pasanen

TUOMAS KOKKO / Helsingin Sanomat