FOR $10 HELP REFUGEES HOST COMMUNITIES IN UGANDA

Kigezi Healthcare Foundation, two months ago, visited the refugees and their hosting communities in West Nile. The West Nile Region is home to about 787,928 refugees, from South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. They live in the districts of Adjumani (245,289), Madi Okollo and Terego (196,458), Obongi (125,687), and Yumbe (227,996).Some are driven from their homes by conflict, poverty or climate change; others leave in the hope of finding a better life. Far too many encounter danger, detention, deprivation and discrimination on their journeys, at destination. Children suffer the most due to their dependency state making them vulnerable. There is always the chronic shortage of sufficient healthcare services, education services and all other social amenities where that are essential for a smooth life. The children suffer from malnutrition due to shortage of food and also due to diseases such as intestinal worms. This has a far-reaching impact where the caretakers find it hard to work as they have to spend time looking after the sickly children hence the breadwinners can’t look for food and other basic needs anymore. This makes their lives more miserable.

During this visit, 350 children were dewormed against intestinal worms which cause illnesses like anemia, intestinal obstruction, diarrhea and malnutrition. This was done through primary schools that they go to. More 53 were supported with scholastic materials that included books, pens and pencils.

This was a stich in time as a great percentage of the few refugee children that go to school always drop out due to many reasons including lack of scholastic materials. This gives us hope as more children will access education and illnesses due to intestinal worm infestations will not be part of their burden in the next few months. We are grateful to the noble people supporting this cause and we encourage more to join us in this push to change our world.

 159 pregnant refugee mothers and host communities in  receive antenatal care services and also 23 receive Rabbits to improve on their nutrition and economic status.

The number of forced migrants increased worldwide, due to unprecedented cultural and political crisis among the many factors. While pregnant refugee women are considered a vulnerable group, concerning their physical and mental health. How do maternal health care professionals manage their maternal health care? From lack of sufficient antenatal care facilities to the hands of unforgiving poverty, maternal health care professionals find it hard to sufficiently provide these pregnant mothers the very best that they deserve. Antenatal care is the care provided to a woman throughout the course of her pregnancy by experienced and skilled health professionals. It includes health education and promotion, fetal growth and well-being assessment, routine screening, and management of any medical or obstetric complications so lacking such a care is very risky to the life of the mother and the child with after effects affecting the rest of the family since most mothers are the reasons why families eat. In about three months, through the effective mobile clinics, Kigezi Healthcare Foundation was able to provide antenatal care services to to 156 refugee mothers and host communities where the women received services that included screening for diseases like HIV, syphilis, gonorrhea and hepatitis, assessment to ascertain if the mothers are risky as regards to pregnant or not, education on nutrition during pregnancy and danger signs in pregnancy that should be reported immediately. It was an enriching experience as the mothers testified to having no knowledge about some of the issues especially regarding appropriate nutrition in pregnancy. The pregnant mothers that were almost at term were given delivery kits to provide some of the necessary things required at birth. Since poverty was at the foundation of most of the challenges such as inability to eat balanced diets, inability to travel to healthcare facilities for antenatal care check ups , Kigezi Healthcare Foundation in liaison with Namangu investments provided 23 on these mothers with 3 rabbits each rabbits to to rare for increased protein consumption. The pregnant mothers received the rabbits in groups of eight where one male and two females were given to each group given the short gestational age of rabbits, in two months, each member of the group will have received rabbits descending from the original three. The mothers were trained on how to feed,shelter and look after rabbits. One would ask themselves why rabbits of all animals? Rabbits were chosen because they multiply quickly and can be kept on  a very small space yet holding large numbers and their feeding on vegetables and plant leaves is affordable. These rabbits were given to the pregnant mothers so that they can provide sufficient protein supply in these refugee camps and the surplus of the rabbits be sold so that the families or pregnant mothers can have some money to spare and use in looking after themselves as regards food, shelter and clothing. We are engaging more private sector companies to support us in this project.

The mobile clinics and rabbits program is taking of steadily but we still appeal to our partners and people that love and support development to continue intensify the funding so as to magnify the impact.