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KALA AZAR - Outbreak anticipated in South Sudan

The World Health Organization has reported that more than 1.5 million people are at risk of contracting Kala Azar disease in South Sudan. Kala azar (visceral leishmaniasis) is contracted through the bite of a parasite carrying sand fly. Symptoms include an enlarged spleen, fever, weakness and wasting tissue. It thrives in poor and remote areas. Children are at highest risk. If untreated, it is fatal in almost 100% of the cases. However, there is up to a 95% cure rate with proper medication and treatment.



A sandfly carrying the Kala Azar parasite

WHO officials are concerned that the severity of this outbreak will be exacerbated the forced repatriation displacement of South Sudanese from the north.Three-quarters of the people of Soth Sudan are unable to access basic medical care and the weak health care system cannot cope with emergencies. This is in an area that the WHO has already described as having a “confluence of the worst diseases on the planet”.
The severity of this outbreak is dwarfed by the wider medical humanitarian crisis facing the entire region, including malaria, measles, meningitis,typhoid and tuberculosis. The influx of refugees from the North will add to the largest population of displaced persons in the world. This will place additional strain on already limited resources, including the lack of adequate food, clean water, and medicines. 


Rob Kirkman with the Sudanese medical team in Borongole

Our Sudanese indigenous partners on the ground know where the need is greatest and how it can be most effectively met in the area we serve. These young men, Dr. Luka Benson and Samuel Koma Levi, are prepared to meet this challenge through our clinic serving the population in and around Borongole and the "Madi Corridor" of Eastern Equatoria. We need to ensure that they have the medications they need to meet the challenge.

Please consider helping by making a contribution by clicking the "Donate Today" button on the right, or sending a check to "Nehemiah Medical Missions", 57 McKinley Terrace, Pittsfield, MA  01201
"If you think you are too small to make a difference, try spending a night in a closed room with a mosquito"   African Proverb

Forgiveness...The Key to Our Unity in Ministry

Upon being referred to the attached article by Paul Tripp from the Gospel Coalition, I feel compelled to share it as an to encouragement to my friends & co-laborers in Operation Nehemiah here and in South Sudan, and to my fellow Elders...

In His Grace,
Rob Kirkman

 

Forgiveness: The Key to Pastoral Unity

Posted By Paul Tripp On March 4, 2012 @ 11:59 PM In Articles of  Interest,Commentary,Featured,Opinion | 5 Comments

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One thing you can know for sure, pastor, is that in the course of your ministry you will be sinned against. You'll be misunderstood, falsely accused, and unfairly judged. Often this will happen in your relationships with those with whom you are ministering. When that happens you can choose to carry a list. You can give way to the temptation to punish the other person. You can choose for disappointment to become distance, for affection to become dislike, and for a ministry partnership to morph into a search for an escape. You can taste the sad harvest of relational détente that so many church staffs live in, or you can plant better seeds and celebrate a much better harvest. The harvest of forgiveness, rooted in God's forgiveness of you, is the kind of ministry relationship everyone wants.
Forgiveness stimulates appreciation and affection. When daily we forgive the people we live and minister with, we do not look at them through the lens of their worst failures and biggest weaknesses. As we talk honestly, weep and pray, and repent and reconcile, our appreciation for each other grows and our affection deepens. We quit looking at the other person as the enemy. We stop protecting ourselves from those who work and live nearest to us and begin to work together to build walls of defense against the many threats to ministry relationships that exist in this fallen world.
Forgiveness produces patience. As we respond God's way in a daily lifestyle of confession and forgiveness, we begin to experience things we never thought we would see in our relationships. We begin to see bad patterns break, we begin to see one another change, and we begin to see love that had grown cold becomes new and vibrant again. When we experience hard moments and God gives us the grace not to give way to powerful emotions and desires that would take us in the wrong direction, we experience the practical help and rescue his wisdom gives us again and again. All this means that we no longer panic when a wrong happens between us and those with whom or to whom we minister. We no longer take matters into our own hands in the panic of hurt and retribution. We no longer try to be the other's conscience or judge. No, we are much more relaxed in the face of failure and willing to patiently follow God's commit-confront-confess-forgive plan. The hardships of ministry relationships have helped us practically see that his grace is bigger than any difficulty we will ever face in our relationships. So we are able to rest and wait, knowing that God is at work, even when ministry relationships have left us exhausted and discouraged, and that he will not quit working until his work in us and our relationships is complete.
Forgiveness is the fertile soil in which unity in relationships grows. When as a pastor you are living every day in the confession and forgiveness pattern of the gospel, you are forsaking your way for a better way. Your relationships are no longer a daily competition for who has power and who is going to get his way. You no longer see the other person as a threat, wondering just when hewill once again get in the way of your ministry desires or goals. You are not obsessed with your comfort, pleasure, and ease and with the fear of how or when the people near you will interrupt them. No, forgiveness puts you on the same page with each other. You have both submitted your desires to the desires of Another. You no longer try to build your own little ministry kingdoms. You now work together for God's kingdom. You now live with the same set of expectations and rules. You now have the same way of thinking about and addressing problems. And together you celebrate what God has given you, together being aware that you could never have done it yourselves. You now experience unity like never before, because forgiving grace has liberated you for a higher purpose and a better daily plan.
Remember, God put people in our lives not just to help us expedite our ministry plans, but to show us the better way of his grace. So we learn to make war, but no longer with one another. Together we battle the one Enemy who is after us and our ministries. As we do this, we all become thankful that grace has freed us from the war with one another that we used to be so good at making.

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Article printed from The Gospel Coalition Blog: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc
URL to article: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/03/04/forgiveness-the-key-to-pastoral-unity/
URLs in this post:

[1] Image: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/files/2012/02/Paul-Tripp-Headshot3.jpg

Preventing Loss of Life on the Road in South Sudan

The staff of Operation Nehemiah have witnessed destruction and loss of life on an almost daily basis on the Juba Nimule Road. On our recent trip we buried friends and relations as a result. With your help, Operation Nehemiah's Medical Missions hopes to deliver a mobile medical unit to transport accident victims quickly to the hospitals in Juba or Nimule. This is our promise and committment to the people traveling this road. Please see my comment following this article from AllAfrica.com. Thanks.

 Sudan: MPs Express Dismay Over Traffic Accidents in Juba-Nimule Road

By Staff Writer, 24 March 2012
Two Ministers of Parliament from constituencies in Madi sector of Magwi County, Eastern Equatoria State, Veronica Redento Undzi and Aventore Amure Bilal from South Sudan Legislative Assembly and Eastern Equatoria State Legislative Assembly respectively told The Citizen yesterday that they were shocked by the high rates of death from traffic accidents on Juba-Nimule road.

"The death toll might have reached over 100 in the last few months," said Bilal, "and it will continue unless drastic steps are taken by those concerned to stop this." He said because of the completion of the road from Nimule to around Kerepi measuring about 55 miles towards Juba and having it now tarmac, drivers of various types of vehicles race along the road in unimaginable speed and resulting to fatal accidents.
He said they have met the undersecretary of Ministry of Roads and Bridges in Juba to explore means of how the Ministry can help solve this problem. In their discussion the undersecretary expressed sorrow for the many lives lost in the highway through reckless driving by some drivers of the different types of vehicles and promised the role of his ministry to curb the accidents.
He said his ministry was only concerned with planting of signs along the highway, drawing of zebra crossings and other symbols and constructing bumps so that these can guide the drivers when using the highway and that direct control of the drivers in the highway was the responsibility of the traffic police under the Ministry of Interior.
The two MPs afterward visited the Ministry of Interior where they met the Deputy Minister General Salva Matok and explained to him the high toll of deaths in Nimule-Juba Road especially in the part from 0 to 55 km between Nimule and Kereppi which had been made tarmac. The Minister expressed sadness to learn about the loss of so many lives and promised that his Ministry would soon send some police personnel who are currently under training on technique of controlling traffic in highway for deployment in the road to check on drivers using the road.
MP Veronica said the Minister also suggested that the fight against the traffic accidents should be shouldered by other sectors besides his ministry and that the media should enlighten the communities living along the highway and school children whose schools are near the road about how to conduct themselves to avoid accidents.
The MP said the minister also stated that the chiefs of the areas should sensitize their subjects about the presence of the highway and challenges related to it so that their people do not face dangers. The Minister was reported to have blessed the suggestion made by the chiefs in Madi sector that uniformed traffic police personnel board buses to ensure that they don't speed between the two points, Nimule and Juba.

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  We have witnessed destruction and loss of life on an almost daily basis on the Juba Nimule Road. We have buried friends and relations as a result. Operation Nehemiah's Medical Missions hopes to deliver a mobile medical unit to transport accident victims quickly to the hospitals in Juba or Nimule. Please pray that this will come to pass soon!

"Tiny, invisible moral forces..."

Upon reflecting upon my recent seven weeks in South Sudan, I find myself resonating with my favorite quote from William James...

"I am done with great things and big things, great institutions and big success. I am for those tiny, invisible moral forces that work from individual to individual, creeping through the crannies of the world like so many rootlets, or like the capillary oozing of water. Yet, if you give them time, they will rend the hardest monuments of man's pride."

Each time I return from South Sudan, I am reminded how we Americans tend to be inclined toward the "bottom line" and obsessed with results and "outcomes". We often envy the accomplishments of others. For me, I find "acomplishments" are summed up in the words of a village chief who says, "Many of us are alive today because of your clinic." My "bottom line" has become the look of a child who finds he is well enough to get out of his sickbed and go home. These things have become enough for me. They speak to a sense of relationship and trust between people of different cultures. God has used them to render the hard monument of my own pride.
The area we serve in East Africa is remote and hard to find... even on a good map or a GPS.  The climate is harsh, and the World Health Organization has described it as an area that has "a confluence of the worst diseases on the planet." However, I find myself compelled to "creep though the crannies of the world" to Eastern Equatoria. I cannot go empty handed. I need to bring medicine, and Michael Levi, the elder of Borongole, said "Next time you come, bring reading glasses."

Would you be part of those "invisible moral forces that work from individual to individual" by joining this blog and making a contribution of any amount so that I can creep back there soon? If so, just click on the Make a Donation button on the right side of the page, or send  a check to "Nehemiah Medical Missions", 57 McKinley Terrace, Pittsfield, MA  01201.

a boy with measles...measles kill in South Sudan.   

Discharge Day!

A Young Defender of Health in Borongole...

        "If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a room with mosquito."
                                                                                                          - African Proverb
    During my recent 7 weeks in our compound in South Sudan I had the pleasure of shadowing our young nurse, Samuel Koma Levi, in his duties in our clinic. I did my best to keep up and do what I could to assist. Samuel is a dedicated young man who makes himself available to address the staggering health care needs of the surrounding population on a 24/7 basis. He lives a few yards from the clinic in a thatched mud hut with his young wife and infant child. I was struck that I have seen such a schedule stress out a "first world" health care worker, including myself, in no time at all. I mentioned this as I was helping him hang an IV bottle on a light fixture for a 4 year old with typhoid (he had no more IV poles), and he simply stated that the work was his greatest joy. On a typical day we found ourselves dealing with multiple cases of malaria, typhoid, trauma, Buruli ulcers, breast cancer, River Blindness, Hepatitis B and a young boy who had suffered trauma with significant tissue loss. An virulent intestinal virus swept through the surrounding villages for about a week, followed by an outbreak of conjunctivis. Samuel's response was simple gratitude "for the medicine that had arrived before the sickness visited". Samuel is visited a few times a week by a young medical resident, Irra Celestino, who works in another clinic miles away. They sit together, pouring over medical texts, and consulting on particularly difficult cases. During my last night in Borongole, I noticed a light in the clinic at about 3am. I entered to find Samuel sitting with a 3 year old girl and her distraught father. She had malaria and typhoid. He had just started an IV and was holding her hand "to help the medicine work, because medicine works best when one is relaxed". I am humbled and grateful to know and work with such young men. Most are young because the war has wiped out so many who are older.  Of course, I come home with a note from Samuel, listing the things he needs to keep the work going. (Near the top of the list are more IV poles!) It is my delight and responsibility to obtain what I can to help him before I return in a few months. I also need to attend an intensive tropical medicine course before I go. To that end, I am appealing to my friends and colleagues to participate with a donation - either by clicking on the donation button on the right side of the blog, or by sending a check to "Nehemiah Medical Missions", 57 McKinley Terrace, Pittsfield, MA 01201.
Thanks,
Rob Kirkman

This is a brief autobiography, from my friend Okot Emmanuel Taban - who we affectionately call "Emma". Emma is a "Child of Fallen Heroes", a war orphan of the SPLA struggle against the north. He has been a great help to the mission here at Borongole since joining the staff last year. I was going to edit his testimony, but since he aspires to be a lawyer journalist and I want to be authentic, I decided to share largely his own words. It is good practice for him, and it gives you a good sense of how the English language  is expressed here.  RK
EMMA - My Story
I am Okot Emmanuel Taban I am a KAKWA  by tribe, born in Torit, Eastern Equatorial  State on 26\11\1991 on a Saturday. I am a Sudanese by nationality. When I was 6 I lost my Dad during the 21 year South Sudanese liberation struggle. When I was 10  my Mum was also killed brutally by the Muslims. I personally witnessed this tragedy and many atrocities of the devastating catastrophic war of the Muslim Sudan government against south Sudanese Christians. My sister, aged 13, and I struggled not to starve after that. Many of our relatives and friends perished during that period of time. This was what the Muslims called the jihad war, which mean "spiritual war" that is still in prevalence up to this date. This war poisoned the mind of this young patriotic nationalist. My father was an officer in the SPLA. He was assassinated in Narus after liberating Kyalas, Narus, Kapoeta, and part of eastern equatorial region. The assassination of my father by fellow countrymen stab me in the back and gave a heavy blow on my face. I immediately died inside and lost respect for any government institution and gave me strong hatred for the Arab race or anyone colonial tendencies. I  studied primary school in this country. But I finished in Uganda because of the aerial  bombardment by jet and antinov bombers on my school and village.  I went to Comboni College and Gulu central high school. But later I had limited chance of advancement because I had been supported by a missionary friend whose funds ran low. This interupted my dream of becoming a lawyer or journalist, but all in all I am giving my gratitude to all the fallen heroes, widows, orphan, wounded heroes, liberation fighters, and international friends. This includes my beloved late dad, Mr. Taban Noah lukudu,  who had served as an operation commander in the liberating zone, and  beloved mum Joyce akio dudu, who was also terribly killed. They all worked hard to see that we are free at last from the chain of oppression and prolonged marginalization. My generation now has a future to make.  I thank God He has softened my heart toward all people, including those considered enemies. He gave me restored respect for the government and showed that the principles my dad and mum fought for were not in vain. I forgive the Muslims who killed my parents and tried to force us to forsake our Jesus. May Almighty God forgive them. I am happy that the gospel of Christ is not overshadowed by the jihad.
So, I Emma, still live by God's grace. By His hand I survived from many dead at the hands of Muslim fighters. I never thought I would go to school, but God touched the heart of an American friend, who saw to it that I would graduate high school. I believe the same God  will provide a way forward for my continued education.  
To my beloved comrade countrymen and future flag bearers  of our newly born country I say what is of paramount importnce  is looking forward rather than looking behind. There is no future in the bitternesses of what is past. We should start doing work rather than we expecting it done for us. The future belong to those who do their home work, not to those who waste their lives, allowing their hair to turn grey just sitting in the moonlight.
Corruption, greed and  laziness can become pandemic crops in our nation We nationalist youth share in the destiny of the land our fathers fought for.  Let us cease from the undying hunger and greed for something better. It causes us to worship idols and brings only strife amongst us. Eenough is enough for war and tribal division. My tears run and flows like a stream, when I see a crawling baby in anguish and hunger. That is more important than whatever else we may want. Anyway may the almighty GOD rescue us and bless us, I say all this for GOD  and my South Sudan.
Amen