Malaria Outbreak!

There has been a severe outbreak of malaria in Shea Village. Last Wednesday my father in law and I flew down to Region 9 to install screens on the doors and windows of the Shea Health Clinic. Three weeks ago when I visited Shea, there was a small outbreak of Malaria, but I assumed that everything was under control.

I assumed wrong…

When we arrived, the captain of the village met us at the airstrip with the grim news that the confirmed cases had ballooned from 34 to 84 in our absence. That is almost a quarter of Shea’s entire population! The captain said that this kind of outbreak is very unusual. In a normal year a couple people will catch the disease, but it never reaches epidemic levels.

The government has sent a microscopist to the village, and he is presently treating the infected villagers with medications. But he spends most of his day laying around the clinic waiting for people to show up.

Fewer than 10% of the villagers have mosquito nets for their hammocks. Some of the nets really need to be replaced since they have gaping holes in them. But the worst part of the crisis is that nothing is being done to control the mosquitoes and their breading environments!

So, what can be done?

First thing tomorrow morning, I’m going to call around to see if there is a fogger we can borrow. The chemicals are pretty cheap, but the foggers are expensive. In the mean time, while we are waiting to find out about the fogger I'm going to get a pump action sprayer and see if I can do some manual spraying with that. I won't be able to cover as much area as with a fogger, but at least we have to try. This would eliminate most of the adult mosquitos.

Second, I’m hoping to get some mosquito nets for the infected, this is going to be a little challenging since there are so many of them. Mosquito nets play a key role in controlling the spread of the disease. Depending on how many nets we get, we’ll probably focus primarily with infected individuals in healthy families. This is the highest risk.

Thirdly we’ll get some mosquito repellant for those with the disease. I noticed that the villagers like to socialize together in the evening after a long day’s work on the farm. They don’t realize the huge risk they are taking since the Anopheles Mosquito feeds primarily in the early evening.

Finally, I hope to do a little public awareness about the disease to help the people protect themselves against infection.

The challenge will be to get all these items together and fly them out to Shea by nightfall tomorrow.

Is there a risk of getting Malaria? Sure… There’s always possibility that I could be infected with malaria myself. But how can we effectively share the gospel if we remain a safe distance during their time of need.

I pray that God will use this crisis situation to open many hearts to the good news of the gospel. People don’t care how much we know until they know how much we care.

Please pray that God would place a hedge of protection around me as I go down
tomorrow.

God bless

James


James & Joy Ash
121 Durban Backlands
Georgetown, Guyana
011-592-227-2184
www.guyanaaviationevangelism.org

James & Joy Ash
Gospel Ministries International
Project Name: Guyana Aviation Evangelism
874 South McDonald SW
McDonald, TN 37353
1 (423) 473-1841 or 1 (423) 473-1842