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Published: October 7th 2008
Our mobile clinic ready to leave our clearing agents' building
Unfortunately, a few moments later, a gust of wind blew a cloud of red dust all over our freshly cleaned truck!“South Africans are good at building houses”
I am very pleased to be able to say that several weeks of working with a local Clearing Agent and the Malawi Revenue Authority (MRA) have paid off. Our project truck has finally been ‘let go’ and we were able to bring her home last night. One additional thing that resulted from all of this bureaucracy is that I spent so much time at the offices of the Clearing Agent that I have made a few new friends in the staff there and have received a dinner invitation!
The reactions from the hospital staff that have seen the truck so far were very positive. Kapoza, one of the current hospital drivers, drove the truck home with a big smile on his face and took great pleasure in pointing out all of the features to his colleagues (the lights, the generator, the water supply, the fridge etc.). After learning that the truck had been configured in South Africa, Hilda, the hospital Matron, proclaimed that she wanted some South Africans to come and build her next home and after having a particularly bad week in the wards, hospital director Dr Kiromera was just generally
very happy to see some progress and have his week end on a slightly better note.
The week ahead is sure to be busy. There is more paperwork to be sorted out for the vehicle including obtaining a Police report (this time I think I will leave the dealings with the Police to the hospital administrator) and insurance. My friend Todd who is here (who loves that people actually say ‘welcome to Malawi, the warm heart of Africa’ and is already planning his next trip back) is going to be using his background in diagnostics and microbiology to design a cleaning protocol for the inside of the truck. I am meeting with Dr Kiromera on Monday morning to go over a lot of the logistics of the project and talk about schedules and the re-sensitization of the community and we also hope to have our instruments validated by the end of the week.
I am excited to be getting closer to actually getting out into the communities and starting to provide free testing. I spent my first significant amount of time in the wards a few weeks ago, with my colleagues Weston and Peter, and lab chief Isaac.
We were seeing some patients that required CD4 testing. I saw the first child (an HIV positive toddler with severe malnutrition amongst other illnesses) and immediately felt sick and thought I was going to pass out. I thought I wasn’t going to be able to see any more patients. However, we carried on around the wards, even into one of the TB isolation rooms (each general ward has a TB room at the back and then isolation rooms off the back of that). I was surprised but very happy to hear that the man we saw in there that day is much better now. I will never forget him or any of the other patients I saw that day and have an enormous amount of respect for the doctors, nurses and clinical officers who spend their days in these wards. Unfortunately I’m ending on not such a happy note this time but, as I always say, this is a country full of contrasts.
I hope everyone is well and will be back soon,
Joanna x
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Jen Waite
non-member comment
Great Job, Joanna!!
Great job on getting the truck out of prison!!! I'm so excited for the start of the project! Keep us posted! I love all the pictures. They make me really want to visit Malawi. Stay out of trouble with the law, you hear me?? :)