Eyes Only Slightly Open
Mike Ferris, the Treasurer for the Malawi Project, continues his narrative concerning his first visit to a Malawi hospital. “I was moving from place to place in a hospital in the central region of Malawi. Each new area of the hospital held more stunning revelations about medical care in a third world country. It was hard to comprehend, and I was seeing it first hand. I knew it would be impossible to fully express what I was seeing when I got back to the states. Then I saw him at the far end of the ward area. He had only recently walked from one of the villages in this mountainous district of Malawi in order to admit his baby. The child was severally dehydrated, and the nurse was administrating an IV solution while he was waiting for the doctor to see his child. A close look, and it was easy to see that the child’s eyes were only slightly open. He was not at all full of life as you would expect from a child his age. I will remember for a very long time how the child looked; not moving, not responsive, not even reacting to the activity around him. There was a look of anguish on his father’s face. the father looked ill as well, but there was little time for anything except his son. The father had no shoes, and wore an old, tattered shirt. He just sat there holding his baby’s hand.”
No Oxygen Available
“I then moved to a bed holding another small child. The nurse said this child as suffering from pneumonia. I could feel his fever as I moved my hand closer and closer to this child’s head. His struggle was evident from the perspiration around his mouth and nose, and from the sound of rasping coming from his lungs. Though it was bad, he was not considered critical enough to be placed on the hospital’s limited oxygen supply. There was only one oxygen generator, and it could only hold three patients at a time. I remember the sadness on the mother’s face, as she seemed to worry about what could happen next. I felt a great urge to reach for the nearest stethoscope, draw on my clinical background, and start shouting orders, and do something that could help these children. As a parent I want my children to have the best care they can get. In America I have several hospitals from which I can choose locally, and that is not to mention our ability to hop on a plane and take them anywhere in the United States. With our resources we have the greatest chance that our children will have full and complete recoveries. I would spare no expense for their care. As I looked at this mother I knew she wanted the same thing for her child. Unfortunately, she is in a part of the world where she had to carry her children many miles to the only hospital within 40 or 50 miles, and even here she would find only limited care, and limited supplies and equipment. This could have been me had God had a different plan, and given me a different set of life circumstances.”