F-100

Hello Everyone, It has been a while, and for that I apologize. Things have been very busy here. We have received a large shipment of F-100 and F-75 from UNICEF and that has been a big help here. F-75 and F-100 are therapeutic milks for children with malnutrition. The F-75 has 75 calories per 100ml. When a child gets to a certain point with malnutrition that child no longer wants to eat which is where F-75 comes in. F-75 gets a child from the point of not wanting to eat to having an appetite again. Once the child has regained the desire to eat they get switched over to F-100 which will help them to rebuild the weight they have lost. I go with Annelies on her rounds in the Hospital occasionally and have seen this stuff work. It is amazing, kids that almost had to be force fed are now happily drinking down their portion of F-100. They change drastically from being sad and having no energy to running up and down the hall of the hospital playing and laughing. One child in particular named Regiles has had a great turn around. Some of the other patients tease him by pretending they are going to take his milk away, well… he is only about two years old but I think you would have a big problem on your hands if you did manage to take his milk away from him :] A sincere thanks to UNICEF for their generous response and sincerity!

In my last blog I told about the discouraging 2 weeks we had with loosing so many children. I am happy to say that we have not lost any little children to malnutrition since then. But, we are still looking to ways we can help prevent some of those types of cases. Annelies and I have been talking about the possibility of starting a little extension clinic up in the mountains near where many of these patients come from that would be able to refer patients down to the clinic here where Dr. Anne-Marie works. Last Sunday we went up into those mountains to visit the church and some patients in the region. While we were on our way to see John Little, the kid two posts below, a man stopped us and asked if we would stop by his house and take a look at his wife who had an infection. There is a real need for some simple medical help up in those mountains and it pulls heavily on both mine and Annelies’ hearts. Annelies and I are getting married next year and have a lot of changes happening in our life at the moment so it is not even certain when we will be able to return to Haiti. But I see a clear need up in that region that Annelies and I could be of great help in.
In other news we made a request to FAO for seeds for the farmers here, we asked for seeds for about 9,000 farmers and received a commitment for about 500 farmers. We received the first shipment of seed from FAO about 2 and a half weeks after planting season. Of the committed 200 bags of seed we have received 40. It has been a bit difficult working with them and a large amount of our time and resources have been spent holding their hand coaxing them to do what they should be doing without our help. We are still waiting for the remaining 160 sacks of seed and where told that they would be here a week and a half ago. But the farmers here where happy to get what they could at the distribution, we are loaning the seed from them and expect them to return it with an increase if they get a good harvest. We would like to start some sort of seed bank here so the farmers have somewhere to go when they need seed. Storing seed is complicated and risky however. But all in all we are thankfull for the help FAO has been giving the farmers.
Annelies and I visited John little, you can see his house here. It has since been replastered. His family situation is complicated and while we would like to build him a new house with a tin roof and a water storage tank we are not sure that he would benefit in the end. His house is about a half hour uphill hike from the nearest water fountain. We may be able to help them out with a new house once we get back and get to know them better. Please be praying for John Little and his family. Also pray that we would have wisdom how to help and how not to help them.
Annelies and I have only two weeks left here in Haiti. December 31st we will be flying to the States for two weeks in California with family and friends. Then we head out to the Netherlands to be with our family and friends there. I may come back to do some work in March in California and Annelies has a job lined up in the Netherlands. We look forward to seeing all of you soon, but we already know that we will be missing the people here in Haiti a lot. Please pray that we would be open to where God leads us in the future.