22 Nov Fighting Cholera in Haiti

Fonda Cassidy with a Haitian boy

Fonda Cassidy

Fonda Cassidy, a nurse, is from Mt. Olivet UB church in Mt. Solon, Va. She has led or participated on UB medical trips to Honduras and Sierra Leone. Here, she writes about going to Haiti in October with Samaritan’s Purse.

In October 2010 I left for Haiti to work with Samaritan’s Purse. I did not realize until I arrived that there was an outbreak of cholera. This is a bacteria that spreads by contact or contaminated water. None of the 5 doctors nor myself had worked anywhere where we have witnessed this. Once you see it, you truly do not forget.

They came with fear frozen in their eyes, drawn up and over with incredible abdominal pain, with profuse emesis and diarrhea. What you soon realize is that the little ones and the older generation will soon die if not cared for properly. They need oral hydrating salts and/or IV solutions to replace their fluids, and an antibiotic.

So we ran cholera camps where we were treating only cholera. If they did not get treatment within 12 hours, they usually died. It is so hard to see death where you are working. Sometimes we would start treating someone, but it would be too late. They would have to be taken out right away and buried. At each clinic we did a lot of teaching and had a pastor to pray with the people.

I worked in 4 different locations in Haiti. One clinic took us about 2 hours to reach. Others were closer. We were able to share Christ with our patients. Personally, I was blessed to lead about 4 of my patients to the Lord. There would be follow-up by a Haitian pastor.

I was able to visit 4 orphanages that were run by Samaritan’s Purse. I taught in about 4 different classrooms about cholera–how it spreads and how to prevent it from happening. I will gladly return to Haiti to help in any capacity that God would want me to.

We have 22 United Brethren churches in Haiti. I was able to meet with the leader, Pastor Oliam Richard. He was a very precious man. He took me to two sites in Cite Soleil where there had been two churches. They now are rubble. Both toppled in the earthquake. There are plans to rebuild.

Safety and security is very important in Haiti. Each time we left the secured compound we had to radio a safety code, and when we arrived at location we also had to radio that we were at our destination.

I witnessed people dying and I witnessed a person being killed by rocks as he tried to steal–the police stoned him to death. Haiti is very rough, but there are thousands of people living in that country that God loves and cares for. He has asked us to be his hands and feet in ministry. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve.

22 Nov Milestones in Mamei Simbo’s Recovery

Billy Simbo, bishop of Sierra Leone Conference, will return to Sierra Leone Monday night, November 22. On Saturday, November 20, he sent this positive report on his wife, Mamei, and her continued recovery after spending three months in the hospital.

Mamei has gone from just making progress to actually recovering from all of the things that have happened to her over the past three months. This week, she reached several key.

The first milestone came on Thursday when the speech therapist cleared Mamei to take liquids by mouth and eating solid food for the first time in over two months. Mamei must have anticipated this by faith, because last Saturday when her cousin, Julie (Beah) Williams was visiting, she told her she wanted Julie to prepare a special kind of rice for her. She told her what sauce to cook with the rice and then Julie was to add some green leaves to the rice to make it slippery. Anyway, today Julie came with the rice and Mamei ate a small portion! The first time she had eaten rice in three months. Now those of you who know us Sierra Leoneans, especially a Mende person, you know that is a long time of suffering.

Her spirits are up, and her speech and thought patterns are much clearer than they were a week ago. She still gets a little confused sometimes, but she can put thoughts together and actively participate in conversations and discussions.

But the biggest milestone came this afternoon. As I sat next to Mamei, she suddenly started to clap.

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15 Nov Jennifer Blandin Home on Furlough

Jennifer Blandin, Global Ministries staff in Macau, returned to the States on November 3 for an extended furlough. Beginning in January 2011, she will be available to speak to United Brethren churches and other groups about what has happened in Macau during the past three years.

Jennifer also plans to complete her Masters degree by August 2011, which is the reason her furlough is being extended.

15 Nov Malvern Building–Before and After

This building at Jamaica's Malvern Camp needs to be rebuilt.

This is what the new building at Malvern Camp will look like.

As already announced, a series of work teams will head to Jamaica in January and February 2011 to help rebuild the dining hall/activity center at Malvern Camp. This is a 50/50 partnership between Global Ministries and the Jamaican churches.

These dates remain available for volunteers:

January 22- 29
January 29 – February 5
February 5-12
February 12-19

We’re looking for team leaders and about 7-8 people per week. Cost per person will be $225 plus airfare to and from Montego Bay. Contact Donna Hollopeter for more information.

09 Nov Mission Project: Send Jamaican Women to Zimbabwe

06 Nov Mamei Simbo Leaves Hospital After 9+ Weeks

Billy Simbo, bishop of Sierra Leone Conference, sent this update on his wife, Mamei, who has been hospitalized in Abington, Pa., for the past nine weeks.

I am happy to report to you that yesterday, Friday, November 5, Mamei was discharged from Abington Hospital to Brookside Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center in Roslyn, Pa. She has made enough progress with her medical care that the hospital deemed that what she now needed was support and rehabilitation, and she can get that outside of the hospital.

So after 9 weeks and four days, we left Abington Memorial Hospital at around 7:30 pm to transition to Brookside. This is a very nice long term-care facility that Mamei came to last year after her second knee surgery. Many of the staff remember her, and they have been to her room to renew acquaintances. We are happy to leave the hospital behind after such a long period of admission.

Mamei will have kidney dialysis three times a week for the foreseeable future. Her kidneys are not producing any waste, so dialysis must take place to get rid of toxins in her blood. Brookside has arranged for outpatient treatment. This means ambulance rides to the dialysis center 3 times weekly.

We are grateful to all of you who have been praying with us from the very beginning of this whole episode in our lives. We thank all of you who have supported us in various ways, letters, phone calls, email, and personal visits either at home or at the hospital It has been a blessing to have all of you as our base of support.

Please pray for the following specific items.

1. That Mamei’s two significant bedsores will heal as quickly as possible without spreading.
2. That Mamei would be given the strength and courage she needs to cooperate with the rehabilitation regimen, as she faces long period of rehabilitation for her knees and the lack of mobility in her left arm and leg. She has a very low pain threshold, but this is a time when she needs to be able to withstand pain related to doing the exercises required.
3. Pray for the continued dialysis. It is a 2-3 hour process that usually leaves Mamei wiped out and tired. We are trusting that her kidneys will pick up after a while, but no one is giving any guarantees. The multiple myeloma does affect kidney functions.
4. After family consultation and consultations with the Global Ministries Office and the Conference personnel in Sierra Leone. I have booked my return flight to Freetown for Monday, November 22, and will arrive on November 23. This will give me about two weeks before the start of our Bi-Annual Conference in Bo. I will be coming back in January after the installation service for the new bishop. Pray for added strength and grace to do the things I have to do back in Sierra Leone to end my term of service, especially with the 3 months absence from the field.
5. Pray for the rest of the family who will have to step in and be by Mamei during the time of her stay here at Brookside.
6. Pray for strength to pack up our personal effects. Mamei and I had planned to work on this between the time she would have normally come to Sierra Leone in November and when we would have returned to the US sometime in the Spring of 2011. Now all of those plans have changed and I have to wrap things up on my own.

Thank you for your willingness to take on our prayer support.