Meet Kenyan community where sheep oil is used as contraceptive

Meet Kenyan community where sheep oil is used as contraceptive

By Lilian Kaivilu

@liliankaivilu

To Ajukwony Samal Aukot, getting  children was almost guaranteed after getting married more than 15 years ago. As a newly married woman, Aukot  looked forward to being a mother, a status that is regarded in high esteem in her Lolupe village in Turkana Central sub county.

Today, she is a mother of 10. On this particular afternoon, we find Aukot arranging files at the nearby Lolupe dispensary. She has just completed her cleaning assignment at the health facility. “Since I was young, I had a lot of interest in sanitation. I would go from house to house encouraging people to dig toilets,” she narrates.

So far, the now community health worker has led her community in constructing 175 toilets. But this is just part of her work as a community health worker. Aukot is vocal about family planning, a topic deemed taboo is most parts of Turkana county.

Ajukwony Samal Aukot, a Turkana resident and a community health worker. PHOTO: LILIAN KAIVILU

Although the county ranks low in the uptake of popular family planning and contraceptive use,Aukot takes  us through  little known traditional methods of child spacing that the community has used over the years.

Once a family is satisfied with the children that they have, Aukot explains, a woman has a number of options to adopt for family planning. All you need, she adds, is your husband’s consent.

In the traditional Turkana culture, the oil is believed to prevent the woman from conceiving. “All you need to do is to take about four spoons of boiled sheep oil, after smearing a good amount of if all over your body. This is enough to close your reproductive system for good. I have seen women use it,” she says with confidence.

The women first boil the oil from a sheep that is slaughtered by the husband. Usually, the sheep is slaughtered on the day that the woman gives birth. The oil is then boiled in a sufuria and left to cool before the mother applies it all over her body and traditional beads. The woman then takes in four spoons of the oil. “Once you swallow this, you cannot conceive. It has worked for us over the years,” she says.

Aukot says some women from the Turkana community have stuck with this traditional way of family planning; one that they say has no side effects. Health workers in the area, however, say that although the method is popular in the region, it has not been proved medically right.

 In her daily work, Aukot is a community health worker in charge of 44 children. As part of her duty, she encourages women to adopt family planning; something she says is not easy. “Traditionally, our community valued children. They see them as a source of wealth. But we are slowly trying to bring in the aspect of family planning,” she explains.

Geryson Lotot Community Health Extension Worker, Lolupe Community unit. PHOTO: Lilian Kaivilu

In this community, other families opt to let their husbands away for two to three years in search for pasture for his livestock. The husband departs a few days after the wife has given birth. “We believe that the husband’s absence is a good opportunity for a woman to stay off sex for those years. This allows our women to space their children without using any contraceptives,” she says.

According to Geryson  Lotot, the Lolupe Community Health Extension worker, the community is slowly changing their perception towards new and proven methods of family planning. “We are keen on community dialogue and that is the approach we use to engage the community,” he says. Lotot, however, says it  is the women who come for family planning commodities from the health facility. “In a month, we get about 40 women coming for family planning commodities. The commonest is the injection,” he adds.