HIV/AIDS Effects on the Family
Posted on | March 7, 2012
Let’s look at the lives of two clients of the Namikango Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT). (All names have been changed to maintain client confidentiality).
Susan
Susan joined the Namikango HIV/AIDS support group in 2009, and recently noted, “The support group has helped me in so many ways, most especially on the spiritual side.” She said before she joined the group she had no hope and thought she would have passed on by now. She also remembers the discrimination and insults when her community learned she tested HIV positive.
Though Susan benefited from the support group, her husband did not join because he feared being laughed at, and discriminated against. Susan notes that, “He takes the ARVs (Antiretroviral medications) but says he cannot join the group, because he fears people will know he is positive and may laugh at him”. She further notes the lack of balanced food supplement is a challenge, since she does not have the money to access better, more nourishing food items.
Judy
Judy is another member of the group, and she is from Mbamba Village. She joined the group in 2010, and reports that she does not regret joining the group. In the past year Judy has learned a number of things that have transformed her health. Like Susan, she remembers the way people laughed at her, when she disclosed that she is positive. However, today she has developed confidence, and even encourages her friends to join the support group. She is a mother of three. Unlike Susan, who still enjoys the love of her husband, Judy’s husband abandoned her when he learned she had tested positive. “Just after I tested positive, my husband left me, saying he could not stay with an HIV positive wife. This obviously aggravated my problem.” Unlike Susan who is supported by her husband (a tailor by profession) Judy depends on piecework, or part time jobs, in order to support her three children.
These two ladies are just examples of women who are silently suffering because of the HIV/AIDS problem besides poverty. However, both feel a great need of funds to assist them to sustain their lives and support their children. Upon receiving supplies from the Malawi Project, in the U.S., and assisting groups Universal Aide Society and the Compassionate Resources Warehouse in British Columbia, Canada, Judy noted, “We appreciate the donation of clothes, shoes and soap that we have received. We are also seeking the provision of start up capital in order for us start small businesses.” Judy added that, “It is indeed good to teach us how to fish, than for you to continue to provide the fish.
You can read more about HIV/AIDS in Malawi here.
Namikango AIDS Program Effective
Posted on | March 1, 2012
Thondwe, Malawi … The HIV/AIDS pandemic came to the limelight 1985 after the first case was diagnosed in Malawi. Since then, a great deal of focus has come to bear on the problem, in order to bring awareness concerning the dangers, and how to prevent further transmission. Among the initiatives, the Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) was put in place, but for a time it received growing resistance because many people feared discrimination if their status was known to be HIV positive. Some sources conclude that only an estimated 1% of the adult population had access to VCT services by 2003. Too, resources were very limited because there were few supporters involved in the programs in those early days.
However, as the years have passed, the awareness campaigns have been intensified. VCT services are far more accessible, even in the “hard to reach” rural areas. During 2010 alone a total of 1,726,762 people over the age of 15 were tested, according to published reports.
VCT Center at Namikango
For years the Namikango Mission Clinic has provided a receptive environment for Voluntary Counseling and Testing services. Testing 2,517 in 2010 and 2,455 in 2011 reflects the success of its outreach. The center provides Prevention of the transmission of mother to child, in the Mother to Child Treatment (PMCT) program, provision for ARVs, and free testing and support group services are made available to the public.
Haswel Chasale, a VCT counselor at the center makes this observation, “The prevalence rate has drastically declined to 8% in 2011, as compared to 14% in 2009/2010” This is the result of more awareness and voluntary testing and counseling. More and more people are taking advantage of these programs.”
In 2011 the center was named the second best VCT program in the district, second only to the Zomba Central Hospital.
Support group at the Center
Responding to the increasing number of HIV cases, a support group was established at Namikango in June 2007. Including men, women and children who have tested positive, this group meets every Thursday for encouragement. Bible teachers from the Mission bring the Word of God, and encourage the attendees to have hope after receiving the news of their HIV status. Additionally, they are taught good nutrition practices, and ways to prepare a balanced meal menu.
The group currently has thirty-two members, but only five are men. Men are said to be reluctant to join the group, as they fear being recognized HIV positive. Discrimination seems to be the major enemy to fight against the disease.
To learn about the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Malawi, click here.
Tags: AIDS In Malawi > Namikango > VCT > Voluntary Counseling and Testing
Sickle Cuts Deep
Posted on | February 21, 2012
Senga Bay, Malawi … “As I enter I can see her sitting on a mat near the back of the house. I can’t believe what I am seeing. How can this have happened, and how can she sit so still, in such hot weather, with her leg propped up as it is. I ask what happened,” recalls Samatha Ludick. Ludick owns the Cool Runnings Lake Resort and Tom’s Campgrounds, just down the beach in Senga Bay. With the cooperation of the Malawi Project, and a number of guests from her Cool Runnings Lake Resort, Ludick has established Clinic at the Gate, a medical outreach program for the hundreds of residents who live in fishing villages along the western shore of Lake Malawi.
Ludick continues, “She shyly tells me she was in the fields cutting grass to re-thatch their house, when the sickle slipped, cutting deep into her skin. As I look closer it is obvious the sickle had cut very deep, and the rest of her leg has developed tropical ulcers. What do I do next?”
The first thing Ludick does for Kamwendo’s wife, Jane, is to give her a proper painkiller. She continues her narrative, “She has been using Hedex, and I know this is only for a “mild to moderate” pain. She needs much more in the way of pain relief. After giving her a stronger painkiller, we take her to Tom’s, my other business, where we have more space and lots of hot water. We clean her up, soak her leg in warm salt water, and remove the dead skin on her foot, trying as hard as we can to not cause her too much pain. Kamwendo assures us she trusts us, so she will accept whatever we need to do to help her, but this does not make it an easy thing to do.”
Caring for this injured woman is all in a day’s work for the owner of this lake resort. In spite of the pressing needs of two businesses, Ludick spends much of her time overseeing a number of assistance programs for the Senga Bay residents.
As she finishes with Jane, she concludes, “All the time I was working on her I was saying, ‘Thank you Lord, thank you for the Malawi Project and the medical supplies they send me. Without them I could not help her.’”
Tags: clinic at the gate
Impact of a Single Wheelchair
Posted on | February 13, 2012
Thondwe, Malawi… As we returned from a fact finding trip to Ntonda Primary School, we met a 12 year-old boy waving from a wheelchair we recognized as having been distributed through the Malawi Project, Namikango Mission, the Free Wheelchair Mission, and many of you. Meet Earnest Makadyera – Earnest now attends school regularly and wants to become a teacher. Since he was paralyzed from birth, spent most of his life crawling through the dust with a slim chance of reaching his goal. His wheelchair gives him a chance.
Wheelchairs, especially rugged and affordable wheelchairs, are difficult to come by in Malawi. First of all, few companies build them. Secondly, the cost is too high for the average Malawian – each wheelchair costs at least 40,000.00 Malawi Kwacha, or about $245. Most families can’t afford this since about 80% of the country’s population lives on less than a dollar a day.
Stories like Earnest’s give us the energy to work a little harder – to pray wholly – to dream a little bigger.
Maybe one day a little boy, previously denied his dream, will help change his nation too.
Roll on, Earnest, we’ll be watching.
Florence is a Shining Gem as She Approaches 90
Posted on | February 6, 2012
A
ge is No Restraint from Serving
Pensacola, Florida … On a warm, sunny, fall afternoon she sat in her living room, clutching a hand-made wire galimoto, and described how this gift had been given to her, by Malawi children, because of what she learned, and did, after reading about a wheelchair organization helping third world countries.
“I was on a plane heading for Ann Arbor, Michigan,” recalls Florence Crosthwaite who is approaching her 90th birthday. “During the trip I was reading the latest issue of Readers Digest magazine. It was the July 2005 issue, and it featured a story about Don Schoendorfer, the founder of the Free Wheelchair Mission in southern California. The magazine had nominated Don as an ‘Everyday Hero’ in its July issue, and I saw the opportunity to have them send wheelchairs to Malawi.”
Florence contacted the Free Wheelchair Mission in Irvine, California. They set up a program for wheelchair distribution with the Malawi Project, and the first shipment of 550 wheelchairs was on its way. This first shipment was quickly distributed, and drew national attention. Soon large numbers of people and organizations were contacting the Project in order to add their names to a growing list to receive the much-needed wheelchairs. The Free Wheelchair Mission specializes in all terrain plastic wheelchairs that are designed with bicycle tires that can easily be replaced in third world nations. The Malawi Project set up distribution points all over the nation and the program started growing. Since that first shipment the number of wheelchairs reaching Malawi, or in transit, has now topped 3,000. Florence will probably never travel to Malawi, nor will she meet the people whose lives she has changed. However, it is evident from stories that come from the cities, towns and villages that countless lives have been changed by the efforts of this one Florida resident. It is obvious she refuses to accept age as a reason, or an excuse, for not helping people half a world away.
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