RENEWED HOPE CHARITABLE FOUNDATION, INC.
Working Together For Zimbabwe's Future
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RENEWED HOPE CHARITABLE FOUNDATION, INC. Working Together For Zimbabwe's Future |
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| September 29, 2006 Dear Readers, ZESA is moving along on getting power poles set and wire strung. It has been necessary for them to remove some trees. This is sad to see when it takes so long to grow a tree. The wiring is nearly complete in the Primary administration building and library. Wiring in the library will provide for a computer lab, if shipping ever becomes possible again. The electrician has gone back to Harare to get more parts. The next project is getting wiring put into our house. Then the electrician will be ready to move to the Secondary School. Electrifying the building for the Knitting and Sewing Co-ops will have to be put off for a time. The project has stopped until we can get cement blocks delivered. The delivery was supposed to have come today but so far no shipment has come. We are told now that the delivery will be made on Friday, October 6. Patience is the key. Actavia, who was taken to the hospital a week ago suffering from pneumonia, has been released and is doing so much better. She has been put on a number for drugs. Hopefully we can get her built up so that she can live a full and productive life. The child I spoke of in a recent journal, which had suffered a seizure here at school, was diagnosed with Bilharzia. He has been treated and is feeling much better. He is able to come to school. Apparently the Bilharzia had triggered the seizure. Bilharzia is a parasite that can penetrate human skin. It attacks the bladder first and if it goes untreated it can attack the liver, heart and brain. The parasite lives in standing water such as ponds or still water in rivers this time of year. It is the larvae of a certain snail that live in these waters. Since many people bathe and do their laundry in the rivers and streams, it is a common problem. Many people maintain a garden along the banks of rivers and streams. They also use water from these sources to water their gardens. Education and the provision of safe water for the rural communities is the only solution. It is an enormous problem. The nurse aid for the dispensary came to us a few days ago to inform us that she had identified nearly 200 children, from the four schools she visits, with Bilharzia. There is no way we can take 200 children to the hospital in Murewa for treatment. We have been informed by Albert Mukondwa, an Environment Health Technician and an Advisory Board Member, that possibly there are three times that many children who are infected. So we are going to provide the names and weight of the children to a staff member at a near by clinic. He will obtain the medicine and come and treat the children. The treatment is a drug taken one time. It cures the ailment and the individual is fine as long as they stay out of infected sources of water. Adequate safe water in each community is the only solution to this problem. Saturday, September 30, 2006 Ralph and I have just come from a visit to Oswald. We doctored the places on his face. The infection seems to be spreading in spite of our efforts. He is nothing but skin and bones. In spite of his condition, he seemed more alert today and glad to see us. Someone goes daily to dress the infected places on his face and neck. There is difficulty getting the family to make sure he has something to eat at the correct times so that he can take his medicine. Unfortunately, there is a limit on what the medicine can do at this stage. It is necessary to make him as comfortable as possible. At home he would be admitted to a hospice care facility. Perhaps that is in the future for this mission. We are becoming aware that families often do not want to be bothered caring for sick relatives. In this case I think they are ignoring Oswald and not giving him his medicine hoping he will die soon. It is heartbreaking but all we can do is check on him daily and administer as much care as possible. I have been taking a bit of food for him or sending it to him by the Nurse Aid on a daily basis. We have learned that when we send a weeks supply of food that it is disappearing. Relatives come and steal it. This is beyond my ability to comprehend. October 7, 2006 We received a call from Albert Mukondwa, a member of the Advisory Board, to tell us that on Thursday, October 12, three people from the hospital in Murewa will come here and spend the day screening the children attending Nyamashato Primary and Secondary Schools and treating them for Bilharzia. Ralph will have to go and pick up the hospital personnel and bring them here and then take them back at the end of the day. They have no transport. We will have to establish another day for them to visit Inyagui and Guzha. It will be a huge job. Last Thursday afternoon, the Nurse Aid in the dispensary, called me to come. There was a child in the dispensary with severe abdominal pain and she didn’t know what to do. When I got there, the child was on the examining room table writhing with pain and crying for help. I suspected appendicitis in spite of the fact the pain was not in the typical location. Ralph drove him to the clinic at Madamombe. He was given an aspirin and sent home, exactly the wrong thing if it is appendicitis. The pain did not subside and so Godfrey, our accountant and also the child’s uncle, went with me and I drove him to Murewa to the hospital. We found the father on our way and he went with us. The boy was admitted with a suspected strangulated hernia. When the Dr. saw him the next day, he identified the problem as bilharzia and treated the child. The boy was dismissed from the hospital the following day. On Friday, we received a call from the Dandara Clinic, telling us that they had admitted one of our orphans overnight. The child was not doing well and needed to be taken to Murewa to the hospital. The child is an HIV patient. And so Ralph made another trip to Murewa to take the child to the hospital. We have no news of her condition. What they are going to do for transportation when we leave to come home is a mystery. The OCC truck is in for repair and has been for almost two weeks. They had been adding oil and continuing to run it without telling Ralph. It overheated and did a lot of damage. The biggest problem is that there is a problem in obtaining repair parts. The center may be without a vehicle for some time. The health of the children is a bigger issue than it has ever been. We need your prayers that God will provide us with Wisdom in making the right decisions for the future of this Mission. It often seems to be a mystery but God knows the plan. We pray that he will provide. Your prayers will help. In His Service, Ralph and Roberta |
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Renewed Hope Charitable Foundation, Inc. | a 501(c)(3) charity | P.O. Box 1476 | Castle Rock, Colorado | 80104-1476 2006 Jounral 07 |