Wednesday, December 30, 2009

A heaping HELPing 12 days of Christmas

One way to cope with stress is to find some humor so I redid the ole Christmas classic "The 12 days of Christmas" and turned it into the heaping HELPing 12 days of Christmas. HELP of course stands for Hôpital Evangélique le Pionnier or the Pioneer Christian Hospital

On the first day of Christmas HELP gave to me.....a case of salmonella typhi.......
On the 12th day of Christmas HELP gave to me
-12 gunshot wounds
-11 kids on oxygen
-10 operations
-9 blood transfusions
-8 nosy visitors
-7 dressing changes
-6 kids with flu
-5 refugees
-4 power outages
-3 amputations
-2 malnourished kids
and a case of salmonella typhi!!!!

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

More Updates

Here are the most recent updates from the Ralstons and the Harveys. The hospital is full, and we continue to be very busy. Pictures to come soon.

Christmas, Update on the DRC Conflict (from the Ralsons blog)

Prayer Net 306b (from the Harveys)

Monday, December 21, 2009

Situation Follow up.

Below are two posts that Dr. Joseph Harvey had made. i thought I would just share them so you can better understand the situation here.

Here is Prayer Net 305
DRC-CONGO: Needs unmet as refugees flee from Congo to Congo

BRAZZAVILLE, 9 December 2009 (IRIN) - Aid agencies have been unable to fully
meet the needs of tens of thousands of people who have fled inter-communal
clashes http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=87252 over natural
resources in northwestern Democratic Republic of Congo, according to the UN
Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

And according to the Humanitarian Affairs Minister in the neighbouring
Republic of Congo, the refugees' destination, time is of the essence.

"We are also afraid of low water levels in the River Ubangi [which
separates the two Congos]," said Emilienne Raoul.

"From 15 December it will be difficult for boats to navigate the Ubangi,"
she added.

"There are now 77,488 refugees in Congo-Brazzaville," said UNHCR's crisis
unit chief Ben Boubacar Diallo.

"Given the number of refugees, the aid would appear to be insufficient. The
needs are enormous," he said, adding that the situation in DRC's Equateur
province had yet to improve.

"We will keep supplying domestic kits [comprising mattresses, mosquito
nets, blankets, basins and jerry cans] while mobilizing agencies," said
Diallo.

"Conditions are harsh. We have not yet registered epidemics because
agencies offering health services have been efficient and vigilant," he
said.

So far the humanitarian response has involved:

- The World Food Programme on 8 December sent a boat with almost 300MT of
food and 1,500 litres of fuel up the Ubangi river to the northern Likouala
region, where the DRC refugees are now living along a 160km stretch of
riparian territory. Some 90 percent of the refugee sites can only be reached
from the river.

- The Italian government announced it has donated 300,000 euros
(US$442,597) to help meet the most pressing needs of the refugees for the
next six months.

- The World Health Organization has made 2MT of medical supplies available
to the Congolese government for delivery to the refugees.

- Some 500MT of food is warehoused in the southern city of Point Noir but
wagons are needed before they can be railfreighted to Brazzaville, from
where they will be sent to Likouala.


And here is prayer net 306

Since October 28, 2009, we have been in a state of heightened security at Pioneer Christian Hospital here in Impfondo, Congo. That was the day that we received the first civilian casualties from fresh fighting in Dongo, a town in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Since October over 77,000 refugees have flooded across the Oubangui River into the Likouala Region of Congo from the Equateur Province of DRC.

We received two more waves of war wounded in November, and hear that more are on the way. From collateral damage, streams of very sick refugees and residents have been flowing into Pioneer Christian Hospital for HELP. Currently more than 50% of our patients need nutritional support, have only the clothes on their backs, and no means to pay for the care we administer. At the same time, we are trying to stem the tide of a confirmed Swine Flu epidemic that has already taken the lives of 3 of the 10 contagious children.

We are glad to be here doing our best to stretch our limited resources and minister effectively to very real needs, but the stress of being so close to a war zone is starting to take its toll.

Things seem to be getting noticeably worse instead of better. God knows if things are about to turn around, or descend into complete chaos, but I believe He wants us to be prepared either way.

A lot has happened just this week:

- On Tuesday, Laurent Fuka (17 year-old son of our surgeon) arrived home after evacuating from Bwamanda, DRC, where he has been attending boarding school for the last year and a half. He and 7 classmates spent a week, fleeing from the rebels on foot, pirogue, UN motorboat, and truck. They had several close encounters on the way. Before leaving one of Laurent’s classmates went to the market to buy some food and was killed by the rebels.

- Tuesday evening we were called upon to treat two wounded rebels at the government hospital. One is a 14 year old boy with a bullet in his right humerus. The other is a 22 year old with a bullet in his buttocks.

- Tuesday night some people came to the government hospital looking for the wounded rebels, intent on rendering vigilante justice. The staff was able to hide the patients, but this significantly delayed them from getting the care they need.

- Wednesday morning during morning report at Pioneer Christian Hospital our maintenance staff heard gunshots coming from the river. This was around the same time a Central African Riverboat was released by the rebels after being held overnight. Occasional gunshots have been heard several other times this week too.

- On Thursday local public high school students went on a riotous rampage after the government teachers went on strike instead of administering final exams for the semester. The students trashed their school, then attacked several private schools in town, beating up other students and staff, destroying classrooms, and smashing computers. The gendarmes and police were called in and ended up arresting 11 students.

- Thursday night a river boat and barge hired by the United Nations to bring emergency food rations for the refugees came under repeated attacks from armed men in dugouts, and motorized longboats recently stolen from the UN refugee agency in DRC. The barge was flying the UN flag and the pusher was flying the Congo-Brazzaville flag. The attack was finally repelled with support from a Congolese military attack helicopter.

- Friday we were interviewed about this crisis by a correspondent from Bloomburg News Service. Maybe it will play on National Public Radio.

- Friday night a river boat barge loaded with fuel for Impfondo was also attacked. Congo-Brazzaville government soldiers traveling with the barge opened fire, reportedly killing a number of DRC rebels, whose bodies fell into the river. The boat arrived in Impfondo this morning with a helicopter escort.

- Saturday the regular Air Congo flight was postponed, and some people say it is because of the increased military activity downriver from Impfondo.

I think we have no choice but to raise our security alert level and review and implement emergency planning.

I didn't want to write this message. As far as we know, we are not in immediate danger, but we do need your help. If you would be willing to join our intercession team to pray for our protection, wage spiritual warfare, and ask for peace on this part of the earth, please send a short message to Danielle Ralston and let her know what day(s)/time(s) you will be praying.

In the meantime, we continue to prepare for our special Christmas Celebration at the hospital chapel scheduled for
this morning, Sunday, December 20. We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Harvey New Year. Bon Dimanche!
For Health & Hope,
Joseph & Rebecca Harvey
Olivia, Claire, Isabelle & Noah

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Merry "Roc"in Christmas

Tis the season to be...???? Jolly? Content? Hot? Evacuated? Yes all the above are possibilities for the Wegner family in the ROC this Christmas season. I wrote last update that the situation had calmed down a bit, but since then there have been some "rebel" attacks on some of the boats coming up the river and this past Thursday there were some R.O.C. troops involved in some shooting as well. There are lots of refugees along the river and it is good to be able to help them, but there are always more. For a sampling last week, we evaluated a woman after a rape and her husband for a spear wound to the thigh, there was another child who came in with 9 days of malaria and a hematocrit (blood count) in the teens. (normal is in the high 30's and 40s) then there was the child with malnutrition and the woman who need an operation for an abscess and.....I could go on. Suffice it to say that we have a lot of work here and there are is now fighting to the north and to the south of us as well but all (so far on the Democratic Republic of Congo side of the river. Our team has mad some evacuation plans to be prepared, and we have some bags packed (just in case) although i must say we feel pretty safe so far.
So continue to pray for our situation here, it is very fluid and can change very fast.
We also have a small epidemic of premature births here. They keep getting smaller and younger but by God's grace they are doing ok.

I also wanted to post some happy holiday Christmas pictures for you from our Christmas service this Sunday.


Here are the "Mary and Joseph of the Christmas play.









Here is one of the refugees singing praises. He has made a remarkable spiritual and physical recovery. One of his songs today he sang was "Jesus M'aime" Go Club Jeunesse of Sherbrooke.






Here is the required children's choir. We actually had a lot of singing today, and the only songs that were not full of joy and excitement were those with European origins (like silent night).





It is sometimes a little to much singing as you can see with Caleb here.











But we are all happy to be celebrating the birth our Savior who was born into a volatile situation of his own. From our family to yours Merry Christmas!

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

updates and corrections

I wanted to write and thank everyone for praying for us in our time of transition. We are all learning a lot and trying to adapt as quickly as we possibly can. I wanted to write and give you some brief updates and to clear up some things that I told many of you as we were speaking in churches.

First an update. The conflict has settled down in the Democratic Republic of Congo and as of now no new refugees are coming our way. This situation can change rapidly so continue to pray for peace in that area. The refugees really do not have a lot but are very grateful to be here. They also do not want to leave since they have no place to go. Our surgeon who is doing a lot of good work with the casualties told one man “You can go home if you want.” The man (who speaks a little English) replies “You go to my home first, and if it is good I come. I not go back first”.
Another update is that we have all but 5 or 6 of our boxes that we shipped on the container. A little is coming on each plane flight that comes into Impfondo (tues, thurs, sat). The kids have had a lot of fun opening the boxes and discovering toys (which should’ve been in every box apparently) and other things. Anna and I are also happy to get some of the stuff we’ve been waiting for.
Correcting some impressions. Number one: we don’t have to iron our clothes. I had told many of you because of the mango fly we would have to do that. One reason we do not is that the mangoes are not in season but the big reason is that we can also just let the clothes dry for over an hour then the larvae do not live. Of course getting our clothes dry here has been a challenge because of the humidity. We usually end up hanging our clothes up inside overnight to dry.
Number 2: our clothes are not being washed in the river. The lady that comes and does them uses an outdoor spigot that we have to do that.
Number 3: The town’s electricity doesn’t even work ½ the time. You can see which part of the town as electricity and who doesn’t sometimes a night. The other thing about that is that since we are on the hospital compound we are hooked into the generator (both solar and diesel) system. Therefore we have power for all the time except it usually runs out on Saturday or Sunday if no big surgeries were done over the weekend.
Number 4: Since we are hooked into the system on the hospital we are working on a 220v, 50htz system which doesn’t work with all of our electric equipment. We can use transformers to get it down to 110-120 volts but things with motors (like sewing machines, and kitchen aid mixers) are more limited use only.
Number 5: mail. It seems that the mail is running on average about 6wks to get here. We’ve gotten some very early birthday cards for the boys already. However, it is hard not to open a letter you’ve gotten so we didn’t make the kids wait. Again, packages are still very iffy as to whether or not they will make it.

I think that takes care of that. I am sure there are some other things that I did not think of that so I will come back to this at a later time.
This week pray on
Monday for the children and Anna as they start another school week which is getting more strenuous.
Tuesday for the patients at the hospital. Pray that we can aide in their physical and spiritual healing.
Wednesday Pray for the hospital staff (both expatriates and nationals) as we are always searching for more nurses and looking for ways to make sure we can pay everyone here.
Thursday pray for the hospital equipment. We need our diesel generator to work ( we are currently using a tractor to run a smaller generator). Pray specifically for Art and Jean-Pierre as they are involved in hospital maintenance .
Friday pray for Anna that she would have the energy to do the things to keep our house running, that she would have opportunity to speak Lingala and French to others as well.
Saturday pray for me to not get discouraged when children die (4 have died since I’ve been here) and that I would succeed in communication with others
Sunday pray for our family to be a family and that Anna and I would maintain a healthy relationship and that we would be good parents to our children.
Everyday praise God that He is faithful and will sustain us as we abide in Him.