There have been several cases of "suspected" cholera here in recent weeks - an unexpected, but small outbreak. I and my co-workers have had the opportunity to work with the local dept. of public health to educate one of the local affected communities about safe water, sanitation, and general prevention and treatment of Cholera. Our Community Health Workers have gone door to door, and our leadership team has attended town meetings. I've sat in the office of the medical director of the biggest local hospital, talking with nurses and doctors about what's being done about cholera. It's been an interesting couple of weeks. (But for those worriers out there -- fear not.) The local health department and organizations like ours are out in the commities spreading the word on prevention, and the people here, living so close to Haiti, are well-educated on how to squelch cholera. Nevertheless - as someone who came here planning to mostly treat high blood pressure and diabetes, :) it has been exciting to be a part of this unexpected (and likely short-lived) medical upheaval. Here are some photos from the past two weeks.
(Above) My colleagues Willy and Tracy tell a community-group how to keep their water sanitized, and discuss polution from trash and sewer waste in the river.
Above left - Willy explains the polution on the local river. Above Right - two teens from one of our communities fashioned an old cool aid box and a piece of tinfoil into a "microphone" and "camera" and pretended to be the press, asking community members and HHI staff what we know about Cholera, at the community-wide prevention meeting our organization hosted last Friday. : ) What a fun way to get the word out! Now why didn't we think of that?!
Meanwhile, the next day, several of our community health workers who'd done the Cholera talk the day before had family members who graduated from high school. One of them (Willy, pictured above) even graduated from high school himself that day. As I cheered at the side of the road while the graduates marched by, it was an interesting reminder to me of how even in the midst of what for the community is a very important (teeny, tiny) cholera outbreak, that has (per local news sources) hospitalized a number of people from the community that some of these graduates are from - still - important things like life still go on every day in the midst of the disease prevention process.
I loved seeing our Community Health Worker Willy - a great health-care leader here, aged 24 - educating his community about how to purify their water to prevent cholera and other diseases one day, and graduating from high school the next! He can now hope to fulfill his dream of going on to medical school! Go Willy! He and the other community health workers are changing the world in so many ways! (Graduating from high school is a huge accomplishment here - and one that often doesn't happen until people are in their 20s due to the financial expense of attending school each year - buying uniforms, etc. These expenses cause many lower income families to have to keep their kids out of school for a year or two here and there throughout their school years when the family can't afford the uniforms or transport to and from classes. I've met a number of middle schoolers here who walk around town cleaning people's shoes in order to raise money for their school supplies for the next year so that they can go.) So - graduating here is an enormous accomplishment. Big congratulations to the graduates! They truly are the future.
There are also a lot of street dogs here, one of which my colleagues and I have recently adopted as our pet and named "Chispa" which means "Spark" (above right). I love Chispa. He's adoreable! But in truth I'm more of a cat person than a dog one. So when this little kitten showed up on my second story balcony the other night, crying for food and his mother, I sooooo wanted to adopt him. But my roommate is allergic, so I didn't take him in. I fed him 3 lids full of powdered milk - the little cutie was super hungry! Then I set out in the neighborhood in the dark, asking several neighborhood kids, until I found his home. (Luckily he is not actually homeless!) I took him back to a nice lady named Ruth who is the owner of his mother. Goodbye baby! Of course Ruth says if I change my mind I can always come on back and adopt him any time. But I think he'll be fine where he is. : ) And he's close enough that I can still visit him when I'm wanting a kitty to hug.
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