“I am a young man from Hela Province with a passion to help mothers through safe deliveries,” shared 23-year-old Gilbert Gei, the only male recipient of the 10 scholarships provided by the United Nations Population Fund Country Office to the University of Goroka’s Midwifery School last week.

“It is not a common sight for a man from my culture to be a midwife and deliver babies because it is seen as a woman’s job but working as a nurse in the labor ward, I have seen firsthand the importance of a midwife and the role they play in saving a mother and a baby’s life.”

Mr. Gilbert Gei completed his nursing studies at Goroka Nursing College, Eastern Highlands Province, in 2020 and returned to his home province, Hela, to work in one of the most remote district hospitals.

“I worked in the Labour Ward at Magarima District Hospital,” shared Mr Gei. “In a month, we would have 18-25 births. About 7-10 of these deliveries would have complications.”

“As a nurse without a midwifery specialisation, I performed vacuum delivery four times and one bridge delivery,” said Mr Gei. “All I was able to perform successfully from watching our in-house midwife.”

When asked why he made the decision to become a midwife, Mr. Gei responded that he wanted to fill a gap that was missing at his district hospital.

“The lone midwife we had at our district hospital, unfortunately, passed away and there was a huge void that she left,” said Mr Gei. “I was doing a midwife's job with no technical knowledge and proper skills for what I was doing. I knew from my heart that I had to become a midwife because there were so many mothers and babies dependent on me.”

Mr. Gei was accepted into the midwifery course at the University of Goroka. However, he was a self-sponsored student which meant he had to pay his K37,000 tuition fee, for his 18-month training, straight from his pocket.

“I enrolled myself with only K5,000, knowing very well that my future in this training was uncertain and I even prepared myself to withdraw knowing my financial limitations.”

“I am extremely grateful to UNFPA for this important scholarship,” said Mr Gei. “It could not have come at a better time. I cried for joy when Sr. Clerah, the Midwifery Coordinator, advised me of this scholarship and that was 1 of 10 students receiving it.”

“There is so much I can do as a midwife and I look forward to successfully completing my studies so I can go back and help my mothers in Komo-Magarima.”

UNFPA provided 10 financial scholarships to midwifery students from the University of Goroka School of Midwifery in its ambitious goal to reduce and eliminate maternal deaths in Papua New Guinea.

According to UNFPA’s State of the World Midwifery report, PNG needs a minimum of 5000 qualified midwives, and currently, the country has less than 800. UNFPA Country Representative Marielle Sander has urged for investment in the midwifery workforce for the country to change the statistics on maternal mortality.