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South Sudan Health providers in desperate need of supplies

March 31, 2015 / By Pat Shea

The casualties of war are many, but it’s the innocent that suffer the most with the lack of healthcare supplies and trained personnel to treat them.

When a civil war broke out in December 2013 in South Sudan, one of the places that suffered the greatest destruction was Malek, a community outside of Bor. Eight home health care promoters, who have worked closely with the United Methodist Southern Sudan Health Projects in Malek since 2011, watched in horror as the area’s only hospital was completely destroyed. All of the effort that workers had put forth for the past few years to educate Malek’s residents about sanitation processes and hygiene basics was suddenly over.

Without a hospital, and quickly realizing their lives were in danger, the home health care promoters had no choice but to escape across the Nile River into misplaced people camps and to a refugee camp in Uganda.

For months the United Methodist Southern Sudan Health Projects coordinators in the United States waited for word that the health care promoters they had worked with – and who had done so much to aid one of the worst health care systems in the world – were alive. Months passed without word until workers were able to slowly make their way back to Malek. Along the way, they continued to do what they were trained for: to help those in need. And they did so with limited supply and without pay for their work.

Slowly word came through to the U.S. that throughout 2014 four teams of two workers each had been serving more than 1,000 patients each month, many suffering from malaria, respiratory issues, digestive concerns, and malnutrition. One of the health care promoters, John Chol Thuom, wrote, “(Our) challenges: lack of raincoats and gumboots for the home health care promoters. Heavy rain has been falling and affects our work. The bicycle we once had was burned; all the books (used for reporting) and bags (used for toting supplies) were destroyed in the crisis.”

The fate of these workers and their patients now comes down to funding.

The United Methodist Southern Sudan Health Projects is actively raising funds to provide health care promoters in South Sudan with books, gumboots, supply bags, and bicycles to allow workers to cover the long distances between villages. Additional money raised will pay the salaries of the workers who have not received payment for their efforts since September 2014; the initiative is quickly working to raise funds to complete their salary for 2014 and 2015.

Those interested in helping the United Methodist South Sudan Health Projects’ Books, Boots, Bags and Bikes fundraising efforts can send their donation to Andrews Memorial UMC, 106 Church St., North Syracuse. You may also make donations to Upper New York Conference Advance Special #3117. There is also a program available for donors who wish to underwrite in full or in part the $1,500 yearly cost of a health care promoter in 2015.

For more information on the Books, Boots, Bags and Bikes fundraising efforts and the United Methodist Southern Sudan Health Projects, or if you would like to have some of our team give a presentation, please contact the Rev. Brad Hunt at Andrews Memorial UMC at (315) 458-0890.

This piece, written by freelance writer Pat Shea, was submitted by the Rev. Elyse Skiles.