When Leela first experienced dizziness, she took a 10-minute break and resumed harvesting crops in the fields for six more hours until she collapsed. The dizzy spells continued for over a week until community health care worker Bhomitra Sutar examined her.
“Looking at her eyes, I understood something was wrong,” Sutar said. Blood tests revealed she was severely anemic. By this time, Leela, a farmworker in Loyra village, in northwestern India’s Rajasthan state — who prefers using her first name to protect her privacy — was two months pregnant.
Sutar referred her to the nearby Bargaon Community Health Center for intravenous iron sucrose treatment. “I knew she wouldn’t go easily because missing even a day’s work could cost her a lot.”
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About the author
Sanket Jain
Sanket Jain is an award-winning independent journalist and documentary photographer based in western India’s Maharashtra state. He is a senior People’s Archive of Rural India and an Earth Journalism Network fellow. His work has appeared in more than 35 publications. Sanket is the recipient of the Covering Climate Now Award, One World Media Award, New York University’s Online Journalism Award, and several other national and international awards.
