It is winter in a small African country of Malawi, and almost noon as we drive south to pick a guide. Our plans are to visit Agnes Leman, an 18-year-old girl who cannot walk. The trip must not be cancelled, as the impact that a wheelchair can make needs to be seen by the American team that arrived at Namikango Mission earlier in the day. We wait patiently for the guide, time ticking slowly away. Finally Mr. Thawani arrives with an apology for a break down with his motorcycle. Four kilometers from the Mission, we leave the tarmac and turn east along a dusty, but passable road that leads to Gagaso village, a tiny group of houses in the Ulumba hills, under Traditional Authority Chikowi-Zomba district. The house is well away from the tarmac road that connects the commercial city of Blantyre with Zomba, Malawi’s former capital.
Upon our arrival we watch as Agnes’ mother picks Agnes up on her back and labourly sits her in the wheelchair, in order to greet the guests. Agnes must weight at least 200 lbs. and her mother not over 100. Her mother explains to us that Agnes was born in 1992, and in time she was able to use her legs to walk, her mouth to a talk, and her hands just as anyone else. This was true for the first four years of her life. Then, unnoticeable, a hungry mosquito landed on the young girl’s innocent body. Little did Agnes, or her family know that she had been injected with malaria giving parasites, but it was even worse than that. It was soon determined that she had cerebral Malaria, the worst from of malaria. “From that time on she could not walk, or talk or handle anything with her hands,” her mother explained to Malawi Project’s Richard Stephens and his guests. Despite several attempts by the parents to help Agnes recover, all the efforts have lead to a fruitless destination. Because of a simple mosquito bite, Agnes’ life has gone though unspeakable pain and anguish. She spends her everyday at home – alone and lonely, from all of her friends.
Witnessing the suffering that Agnes’ mother experiences from early morning to late at night, as she tries to move Agnes from one place to another Brent Gourley, a visitor with the Malawi Project, could not hide his emotions when he saw the scene in front of him. His eyes were swimming in tears as he saw Agnes’s mother struggle to pick up Agnes, and how helpless Agnes was without the wheelchair.
“The time will come when Agnes will join all of us in heaven with able legs. She will be able to walk, and all of the pain will be gone. In the meantime God has given us an opportunity to help this girl,” Richard Stephens encouraged Agnes’s family members.
It is evident that by making mosquito nets and repellent available to children less than five years old could eliminate malaria in this third world country. In the meantime reports indicate that 40% of all people in Malawian healthcare facilities are suffering from malaria, the largest percentage being children under five years of age.
Short of ending the plagues of malaria, polio, and other diseases and accidents that bring us so many people with disabilities, the need for the wheelchairs will continue on a massive scale.
Wilson Isaac Tembo & Richard Stephens