Dear Friends of International Health Partners US and TZ
Christmas Greetings and Happy New Year. As you sat around the Christmas tree opening presents, I hope you remembered the great gift you gave us. Your friendship, support and money have helped us provide medical care and facilities. Know that we deeply appreciate your good thoughts and prayers and participation in the projects!
If you go to our website, you will find in the upper left hand corner, a rectangle that says, “Just Give!” If you click on that, you will find a very convenient way to contribute to IHP. You can designate the gift to a specific project or give an undesignated gift. And what is more, they keep track of your gifts and will be able to give you reports!
Let me tell you what our present undesignated gifts are doing. They are building a very unglamorous part of the hospital: the septic system. No one ever thinks of giving for that, but it is a very essential part of the hospital.
Progress: The Patricia Schroeder Ward is now getting finishing touches. The inside walls are plastered with cement. We don’t plaster with plaster here! The toilets are being installed as are the shower stalls. Then we will smooth the floors with cement. We would like to do terrazzo but we have lots of patients and teams coming, so we are finishing the floor with cement for the short term.
Three phase electricity is being installed throughout the area. That has been a particularly long process since the electrical company did not have the equipment to do so. As they say here, “Kesho” or tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow will come on January 2, 2008. It will be a cause for celebration.
Our little surgical room is looking more and more like a surgery everyday. And we are going to hire Dr. Danny Dyauli who will do surgery every other day. His salary will be 600,000 TZ shillings a month…or about $500 a month. The clinic can afford $350 a month so if anyone wants to supplement this good man’s salary, we will gratefully receive it. Once we become a registered hospital, salary grants will come from the government to help us, but until then, staffing remains an urgent need.
The Nursing School of Saint John’s University of Tanzania is off and running. The container of nursing supplies, books and computers has landed in the port, so soon all of that will be available for teaching…a very large miracle! All 66 first year students tell me to give you the message of how grateful they are! Special thanks to Cathy and John Nosek who did all the donkey work of gathering everything, storing and packing the container. It is a miserable job, but if they could see the joy in the Nursing Department, they would feel it is all worthwhile.
Dr. Lofstrom and his wife Paula are making their way back to Mwanza on the 10th. We will be overjoyed to see them…especially me. Although I can now walk into a room and give an estimate of the cost of renovation, and now spend my days in anyplace I am looking at how the room was built, I am not the expert Dr. Lofstrom is. And Nyakato does not have the sparkle that Paula brings to everything. We are grateful for the gifts you gave them, and especially grateful to have them back.
The first medical team comes a few days after they arrive…an eye team which will replace cataracts with lens implants. In other words, they will give the gift of sight to the blind. Know that your donations also make it possible to do this work at Nyakato. You did not know on Christmas Eve that you work bringing sight to the blind!
Above is the only snow we have in Tanzania. It is hot, hot, hot here in Dar es Salaam, but very cool in Mwanza. I sat in the living room with 2 blankets around me and shivered. I feel for all of you in the snow.
With thankful hearts,
Mary Ellen Kitundu as well as Dr. Dennis and Paula Lofstrom