A Healthier Future for South Sudan's Families

In May 2019, Emmanuel, aged 4, was brought by his mother to the International Medical Corps-supported health facility at the Malakal Teaching Hospital in South Sudan. Emmanuel suffered from a rare abdominal condition—his liver was outside his abdominal cavity, protected only by his skin, and a corresponding mass had formed on his umbilical region.

Emmanuel’s mother, 29-year-old Lucia, had traveled to several different local health facilities seeking help. Each one referred her to a larger hospital.

“When I took Emmanuel to the other health facilities, I was advised to take him to either Khartoum or Nairobi, but I could not afford the trip,” she explains. “Meanwhile, the mass was growing and my child was getting sick, weak and could not play with other children.”

A single mother of two, Lucia lives with her children at her parents’ home in Malakal. She has no stable income to provide for her family, and relies on humanitarian assistance to make ends meet.

When news of Emmanuel’s ailment reached International Medical Corps, our medical personnel visited the home and listened to Lucia’s touching story of her son’s plight. They immediately recommended that she take Emmanuel to our health facility for treatment.

After International Medical Corps surgeon Dr. Joseph examined Emmanuel, he and a dedicated medical team performed a successful surgery on the boy’s abdomen. The procedure consisted of separating the liver from the abdominal skin, opening the abdominal cavity and placing the liver within it. “We were surprised that the mass corresponded to the abnormal location of the liver,” says Dr. Joseph.

Emmanuel responded well to treatment after the surgery and was discharged from the hospital after 15 days. One year later, Emmanuel had fully recovered and returned to the hospital for his final follow-up appointment.

“Emmanuel’s grandparents and I are so happy and thankful for what International Medical Corps has done for my child,” says Lucia. “You saved my son’s life and we didn’t have to travel abroad to seek better care, a cost that I couldn't have managed.”

International Medical Corps provides comprehensive, integrated primary and secondary healthcare services at the protection-of-civilians site in Malakal. The facility includes an operating theatre for emergency surgeries that is the only functional surgical center for obstetrical and emergency cases in Upper Nile state. Patients from across the region come there for treatment.

Being a doctor in South Sudan—a conflict-ridden, chronically insecure, abysmally poor country—is one of the most daunting professions on earth. Dr. Joshua, a South Sudanese medical professional in charge of International Medical Corps’ health facility in Juba’s “protection of civilians” camp, has faced many challenges over the past four-and-a-half years. When asked about the circumstances that he and his colleagues face on a daily basis, he says, with surprising lightheartedness, “We manage.” Then in May, Dr. Joshua encountered a new challenge: he contracted COVID-19.

He still does not know how he got it. As soon as reports started coming in about the pandemic, International Medical Corps took protective measures to ensure the safety of our staff around the world. He assumes he contracted the virus from a civilian who traveled to the market, where the first COVID-19 cases started appearing in early April.

In early May, Dr. Joshua came down with a severe headache. At first, this didn’t seem unusual—he sometimes gets headaches after long, stressful days. But he couldn’t sleep this one off. So he called his colleague and he told him to put on personal protective equipment (PPE) and come over to take a sample. When the test came back positive two days later, Dr. Joshua’s biggest worry was not his own health, but whether he would transmit the virus to others—particularly his patients with chronic illnesses.

By May 11, Dr. Joshua had developed a cough, high fever and chills, and our South Sudan team prepared an ambulance to take him to the COVID-19 treatment center. “During treatment, I wasn’t scared because there were a lot of people who took care of me and came and checked on me often,” he says. “I got a lot of support from my International Medical Corps colleagues in South Sudan and around the world, and lots of phone calls from my relatives and friends.”

Dr. Joshua could not be discharged until he had two consecutive negative test results, which finally happened on June 14—more than a month after the ambulance came to get him. He went back to work the very next day. “Coming back to work was very right,” he says. “I had a lot of welcoming from colleagues and the community, who told me how valuable I was to them for taking care of them.”

Across South Sudan, the number of COVID-19 cases is increasing every day, but health facilities have not yet been overwhelmed, as many people are choosing to stay home to heal, according to Dr. Joshua. International Medical Corps, which expanded the Juba Infectious Disease Unit in May and set up the country’s first and only intensive-care unit, remains vigilant to the pandemic’s threat and is prepared to respond rapidly.

Dr. Joshua remains positive and grateful. “I would like to send my gratitude to everyone who was concerned for my health from International Medical Corps, the Juba community and my colleagues who have been with me over my entire career,” he says. “I am very healthy and happy now.”

Thanks to the generous support of the GlobalGiving community, International Medical Corps continues to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in South Sudan.