Earthquake Relief
Latest Update 24th March 2010
After an eventful 44 hours of travelling and an extended negotiation period at the Haitian border the LemonAid medical team made it to Lagonave, Haiti with over 1500kg of medical supplies. The 20 strong mobile clinic team including interpreters has been leaving at 7am each day since Monday for the ardous two and a half our drive to Gros Mangles a town about 31km from where the team is staying. In the first three days we have done blood tests, medical checks and vaccinations as well as providing medicines where required to over 350 children. As well as this we have visited the orphanage on Monday after mumps broke out there over the weekend. All 62 orphans were checked and received vaccinations against Hib, meningitis and hepatitus B. Stephen Hawes and peter Hulme our two emergency med doctors from Manchester have been based at the hospital in anse gallet and have been dealing with a myriad of trauma cases Our 4 fix it guys have been extremely busy and so far have restored water to the operating theatre and orphanage, rewired cooling fan at the generator station, replaced shocks/brakes on the hospital vehicle, fitted uv systems in the doctors home to give them drinking water and much much more. Today the mobile team moves to the town of troullijene and todays target of 200 children. The entire team is now healthy which is great. We have had a few sicknesses but nothing severe or lasting for more than a day. Its really hot here so adjusting to the haitian pace is essential. More updates to follow. Justin
In the first few of days after the initial earthquake struck, we were kept up to
date with events on the ground by Pastors Dan and Joy Irvine who run the
Wesleyan
Hospital
on Lagonave. It
soon became clear that sending money to them to get the medicines, food and fuel
that they needed urgently was not going to work as the banks and
Western
Union
had no access to
funds, and medicines were not freely available. As a result, we decided, in
discussions with Pastor Dan, that we could help most by hand delivering medical
supplies.
Our first relief team consisting of Justin, Jimmy, Adrian and
Charlie left
Dunfermline
with our prayers at
10pm
on 18 January for
the long drive to Heathrow with 40 bags in the back of the bus. They arrived
safely at
Port-au-Prince
2 days later, all
bags intact, and with no problems at customs in either the
UK
or
USA
. The medicines were
delivered to a temporary clinic Pastor Dan had set up in
Port-au-Prince
, arriving just in
time.
The guys spent a very short amount of time on Lagonave on Friday
to assess the situation. The plan had been to stay for longer, but medical
emergencies meant that the flight had to leave earlier than planned. Whilst
Lagonave was near the centre of the earthquake zone, the death rate has been
lower because the structures on Lagonave are generally single story and often
little more than a shack. However, almost every family has suffered loss of
family members, homes or possessions. The hospital that serves the island is in
a very bad state of repair and we're not yet sure if it is repairable. Obviously
we're praying that we'll be able to bring forward our plans for building the new
hospital. We're delighted that all the fresh water wells we've drilled over the
last couple of years have been unaffected by the earthquake, but we've not heard
from all the projects that we've worked with, although all the orphans in the
orphanage at the hospital were unharmed.
The first team returned to the
UK
on 25 January, but
there was no rest and our second relief team of Charlie, Dan, Jarvie & Kain
left on 1 February, returning 10 February having delivered another ton of
medicines etc.
The existing trip planned for March trip will still go
ahead, and we're increasing the number of doctors going, as well as various
skilled tradesmen.
This has all been made possible by the great donations we have been receiving from supporters of Lemon Aid. The first
two trips cost approximately £30,000 and all new donations are being put towards
our current relief effort which will cost approximately £20,000. This third trip
left
Dunfermline
on 19 February and
after a 24 hour delay in
Manchester
arrived in the
Dominican
Republic
for the long drive
to
Haiti
. They are now
safely in
Haiti
with the 1500Kgs of
medical supplies. All the medicines we're taking have been specifically
requested by our contacts in
Haiti
to meet immediate
needs and save lives, as their supply chains are still not intact.
If you
are a taxpayer, did you know that you're able to increase the value of your
donation to Lemon Aid Limited without actually sending us any more funds. By
making the donation under gift aid, we are able to reclaim the tax that you've
paid on that donation direct from the government. For every £1 that you give, we
can reclaim 28p. I know that some of you have already done this, but if you
haven't, and you'd like to increase your giving in this way, please could you
download a Gift Aid Declaration
Form, complete the donor details section and return it to us at Lemon Aid
Limited, 131 Garvock Hill, Dunfermline, Fife, KY11 4JU. You also need to tick
the third box, "All gifts of money that I have made in the past 6 years and all
future gifts of money that I make from the date of this declaration as Gift Aid
donations." This is only available to
UK
tax payers.
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