April 2004
Dear Friends,
We wanted to take the opportunity to share with you all a project
that we are going to begin with your help. During the months last
year when we toured and spoke to so many of you, we shared the
needs of the people of the Congo and, in particular, those of
women and children. Some of you might recall the statistics: one
of fourteen women die of pregnancy, and two or three children
of every ten die before their fifth birthday. We feel awful about
this and want to try to work with the folks here to make a difference
through the initiation of what is commonly called a “safe
motherhood” program, which includes family planning and
emphasis on nutrition and wellbeing of children. There are many
such programs around the world, including volunteers who transport
women to the hospital on litters over many miles, bicycles modified
as ambulances and, in some areas, charitable organizations such
as Mission Aviation Fellowship, who fly bush planes to rescue
people from villages, including women in prolonged labor. Here
in the Congo, we face tremendous obstacles. First, there is no
communication other than word of mouth with most villages, which
can be 50 miles from the nearest hospital. That hospital may only
have one doctor and that doctor may not be there. Even if the
doctor is in, the hospital may have no sutures or anesthetic.
There are no established relays of people prepared to respond
to these needs. You have heard of baking from scratch. This is
saving lives from scratch. We are blessed here in Tshikaji with
two physicians who have hearts for public/preventative health.
Dr. Mubikayi is the chief physician of our health zone, and Dr.
Mwala is the medical director of our institution. Both have training
in public health and a will to work toward helping their population.
On to the program! We intend to start by identifying a common
village person who has good communication skills. We’ll
ask him or her to work with focal groups in the villages, asking
them how they view problems of pregnancy, including death and
disability of women and children. We will also formulate open-ended
questions about malnutrition and infant illness to get a feel
of the view of the people. From these views we will design more
open-ended questions to seek the views of folks as to how these
problems might be addressed. The idea is that only if people own
a program can it succeed. Jesus, all knowing, always first asked
what He could do for someone. We must follow His lead. From this
we hope to develop strategies that we can test to determine their
effectiveness, first in our local health zone, and then in the
hospitals of the Congo Presbyterian Church.
A short time ago we made a request for funds for the purchase
of a vehicle that we can use in this project. We have raised some
of the funds and PC(USA) and the Medical Benevolence Foundation
have agreed to front some of the money to complete the purchase.
We have a ways to go to raise all of the money and replacement
parts. (There is no local auto parts store where we can get replacement
parts). We are getting better at begging! The car has been ordered
and will arrive in a few months. We thank all of you for your
help, be it directly for the car, for community health, or for
the other specific requests that we made. We are so grateful for
your assistance and feel that we are truly partners with you in
God’s work here in the Congo. |
