chrismas greetings 2009
Dear friends,
please allow me to address the friendly natives from Germany in English as this information is also destined for our friends at RC Folkestone whose ability to communicate with us in the Saxon tongue of our common ancestors has faded over the centuries so I chose this dialect they are familiar with.
Seriously now, attached please find Christmas greetings from Sr. Fatima OP at St. Dominic's and maybe the information is worth to be included in our communications to our club members to let them know what happened with their donations.
For our friends at Folkestone, here comes a translation of the first four paragraphs on page 2, (my comments) :
"In May next year, we (the German Dominican sisters and Sr. Fatima personally !) have been here in Ghana for 50 years. If we look back and see our hospital and the work done in retrospect, we have all reason to thank God for his help and protection. With the opening of the dental clinic, the development of our hospital is complete by now. All departments are very busy all the time. Our Eye Clinic (built with Rotary funds from Germany and continously supported by Rotarian ophthalmologists from Germany) is receiving patients from all over the country. At maternity ward, 2,500 babies were born this year.
Our Primary Health Service (Sr. Miguela, Dr. Maite and the AIDS Clinic team) could document a marvellous success. Out of 32 babies born to HIV positive mothers, only 1 was found infected at 18 months (Being free from HIV transmission during birth can only be documented in Ghana by blood sampling at 18 months or older. The expected figure without treatment would be about 16/32 instead of 1/32 !)
In our Intensive Care Room for sick neonates and prematures we could help many little ones (yes, this was our first matching grant project with the Quadrangle years ago !! Still going strong !) . We were especially delighted with premature triplets, three girls. They were born in a car with 900, 1000 and 1100 gm birth weight (the three together had the weight of one healthy neonate ! "Thirds" rather than "triplets" !) The young mother was completely overstressed and could not breast-feed. We could discharge all three babies to the bush in good health weighing over 2 kgms each. They are brought regularily to receive their formula feed rations and are strong and vital.
Because of Inflation and ever-climbing cost of living and transport, the poor in the bush still have to rely on our support. The larger family structures are vanishing and smaller families are not stable. Many men try to escape their duties as fathers and leave the women alone to care for the children and their education.
As everywhere, we are facing great and small problems and obstacles, but also great joy and reward with our work. We do not give up our hope for improvement, continue to fight poverty and disease and help whereever we can. Through your generous support we could continue to support the education of school children, pay for medication and help the poor to master their difficulties. May God bless you all for your help.
Sister Fatima, 83 years of age, arrived from Germany in Akwatia in 1959 (!!), founded the Children's Hospital there and has been the Chief Paediatric Nurse for 49 1/2 years now. Her experience in Tropical Child Health and Neonatal Care is second to none, as is her selfless dedication to sick and poor children. She wrote this letter on a computer and is extremely quick with the mobile phone keyboard sending SMS messages.
Kindest regards and very best Christmas wishes
Your friend
Klaus G Gerdts