|
This may be the only time that we advocate for a high salt diet. As we converse
with you in the next few paragraphs we ask that if your blood pressure does
increase, it will rise only to help us address the concerns and challenges of
2007. No stroke from a pen here, please!
The Thistle family is well, though our wellbeing does not reflect on the nation around us. It’s sad to say that what you may have read in the foreign press about health care in Zimbabwe is true: doctor's strikes, nurses exiting the country ‘as if we had the plague’, poor service provision, and overcrowded mortuaries. People are flocking to the rural areas seeking care at mission hospitals such as Howard. It would be overwhelming for us… except for the unaffordable cost of transportation from cities to the countryside. When your sick relative is bedridden you have to hire a private vehicle. There’s no room for stretchers on the chicken buses.
Living and working at Howard is a survivor series without the camera crew and desert island, both for the patient and the hospital. It’s no longer just about HIV, hypertension and hippo- bites. It’s about high unemployment, an economy that has receded by 75 percent, and lack of basic commodities, including medicines and hospital supplies. Our workers just received their annual increment of 350 percent, but inflation is 1200 percent per annum. Go figure! The government has stopped issuing passports.
Everybody’s pining. The nation needs healing, and in many ways, it was for times like these, that we were called. Though we are medical missionaries not economists, or politicians, Howard’s holistic approach to community care provides us with critical occasions to reach out to people at the extremes of their lives. Holistic because, whether in the villages of rural Zimbabwe or on the streets of urban North America, people everywhere need salvation, hope and healing. These felt needs are perhaps much more evident around Zimbabwe these days.
There was little on the shelves and trolleys in the hospital when we returned in November; but through the generosity of our friends we now have basics such as soap, gloves, intravenous fluids, and diesel fuel. We’re learning that we will have to import most of our necessities from overseas requiring more foresight, planning and effort. Real prices are less expensive abroad.
We have been blessed by the continued faithfulness of our friends, and for their patience with our patients: Donations may take time to be received, and reinvested in the community. A sponsored child may drop out of school. Valuable hospital equipment can break down and take many months to repair. But people are being healed and lives are being transformed.
|
Yes, the Thistles are back to work. Paul didn't think it would be so stressful returning to the queues outside his office. Our holiday in Canada seems such a long time ago; it was not a complete vacation, but even our studies at the College for Officer Training CFOT Winnipeg were a refreshing change, precious time to devote to theology and homiletics, far from the maddening crowd. To everything there is a season, and ours was only five weeks. We’re now studying New Testament by long distance, but without internet, fax and reliable post, we guess we’ll have to use New Testament methods of study. Donations of sheepskin are accepted. Pedrinah is continuing with her studies by correspondence with the University of South Africa. The multitasking continues.
James the Elder has started Grade One. He’s learning to spell and appreciate the word, ‘work’ in homework. We remind him that even soccer stars should be able to read their contracts. Alexander is the Happy Wanderer, somehow navigating through locked doors and windows to reach his friends outside; he has rebuffed the constant attempts of his older brother to make him cry.
While other institutions in Zimbabwe are reducing in size, we’re still looking beyond the confines of the present to the long-term needs of our community. We could not imagine this without your partnership. Please assist us in praying for:
-
Economic stability in Zimbabwe
-
The expansion of our Community Based Care, our AIDS Education, and HIV/TB Treatment. Program logistics are always a challenge, more so in 2007.
-
Orphan care including child sponsorship and micro-enterprise projects. Zimbabwe has the highest percentage of orphaned children in the world; one in four are orphaned, in most cases because of HIV/AIDS.
-
Human resources and financial support for the purchase of supplies and medicines.
-
That the God who created the universe, and kept it through all time, will provide both the personnel and finances to equip our hospital.
-
Our health and safety
It’s been months since we’ve heard from many of you, a reflection of the busyness of our lives,
two worlds apart. Please drop us a note when
you are able. We look forward to hearing from
you and possibly seeing you when home in
Canada for commissioning later this year.
Thank you.
Your friends,
Paul, Pedrinah
James & Alexander
pjthistle@hotmail.com
The Salvation Army Howard Hospital
PO Box 190 Glendale, Zimbabwe
“’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.“
John Newton
|
