home» Articles» 2012» Famine relief Africa: sometimes it is like tilting at windmills…

...but nevertheless they manage to smile

What it means to help, what our honorary humedica mission team members think during and after a mission, and about questions posed by themselves and others, is described by the young physician Heidi Zach, who used her holiday to take part in a mission in the south of Ethiopia.

“In November I could participate in my first humedica mission at the Melkadida refugee camp, which is located 70 kilometres from Dollo Ado. When people at home ask me “What was it like? Tell us something about it!”, it has been and still is hard to express this experience in words.

It simply was indescribable and overwhelming. I could think that the work I did in those few weeks was by far more useful than everything I had done in all the years before.

Again and again I am surprised by questions such as “What? Disaster relief? Which disasters are there currently in Africa?” It is incredible how fast-moving our world is, and how soon we get used to terrible news. We think we know about all the misery from TV, but then you only really get an impression of it, when you actually see reality, hear it, feel it, smell it… experience it with all your senses.

When arriving in Ethiopia, at first I had the impression that it was a very green country, but when we got closer to Dollo Ado, and hence further south, the landscape turned ever drier, browner and more withered.

Notwithstanding, the wet season had set in after a delay of three years, and – although people had been longing for rain desperately – it brought with it many problems regarding the refugees’ provision with supplies. In addition to the already dismal situation, roads were frequently blocked by the torrential rainfalls and the newly emerging raging currents that suddenly resulted from them.

Therefore it was sometimes simply impossible for us to offer the urgently needed help at camp. What happens, if I get stuck in a traffic jam at home and get late to work? Absolutely nothing! There are colleagues who could stand in for me without problems. However, if our medical team could not get to the refugees, people who urgently needed our help could probably die.

On those – fortunately only few – days, when we were forced to suspend our work, we could only guess the extent of misery at the camp. Later we were told that many accommodations or tents had been flooded and that some people had even drowned.

On the days after the flood, we could still see the terrible traces of the rain at and around the camp. We had to drive round collapsed bridges, which would render larger relief supply deliveries by truck almost impossible for some time, and the camp was covered by mud and sludge as far as the eye could see.

I am not talking of the kind of mud we know from home, but due to the dismal hygienic conditions, and among other things due to overflowing latrines, or the lack of them, it was a sea of germs that flowed through the tents.

Fortunately, these days were rather the exception and after the drive of one hour and half we could start our work at camp almost every day at about 8.30am.

On the one hand we worked at the health centre, an infirmary we ran in cooperation with ARRA, and on the other hand we worked at our humedica health centre at the opposite end of the camp. In this way we could treat almost 100 patients per day. Most of them were children and infants, but we treated also adults, as well as elderly and frail women and men.

Despite temperatures of at least 40 degrees in the tents, masses of flies and seriously ill patients, I never thought of asking myself “Why am I doing this?”. I rather wondered more and more often: “How could I not do this?”

An extremely high number of often very weak patients and numerous infants suffered from respiratory infections, diarrhoea, high fever, helminthiasis and terrible skin infections – mostly even from all of these complaints at once.

During an almost a little too empathetic experience, I realised for myself just how terrible this bronchitis feels, from which almost every child at the camp suffers mostly as an early stage of pneumonia. And that even though I had a roof over my head, enough to eat, and above all immediate access to my first-aid kit.

I could only guess how a patient at Melkadida would feel, whose living conditions were not even anywhere near mine. A nightmare, to which without medical treatment there often is no awakening. Unbelievable, but a fistful of antibiotic tablets can save lives in many cases.

Meningitis, pertussis, tetanus and above all tuberculosis accompanied by malnutrition were the diseases which, unfortunately, often reminded us of our own limits. And we only saw those persons who managed to come to us.

To fight these highly contagious diseases, and to manage them at a camp where an extended family often has to live in one single tent in extremely close quarters, often was like tilting at windmills. And there is a heavy storm blowing at Melkadida.

But obstacles are there to be overcome, and I am convinced that we could and can help a large number of persons, who otherwise would not have had the slightest trace of a chance.

All the more valuable were therefore the numerous moments in which you could see the people at Melkadida laugh and even joke despite their misery. Children who waved at us and were happy when we returned their greeting. People who came to us only to thank us with all their hearts for the fact that their children were over the worst after two days of medical care and antibiotics. Loving gestures between siblings who took care of each other.

Touching moments, which I will always remember and which make me wonder about who are the real heroes of this story.

Again and again I was grateful that I could take part in this mission “only as a doctor”, as a small part of a great team. I could concentrate on helping the people as far as possible. But at the same time I am absolutely aware of the fact that this would not have been possible, if it had not been for the incredibly persistent team of coordinators on several continents, who constantly and untiringly ensured the project’s smooth running. Thank you for that!

The general result of such a mission is that you suddenly realise just what a little, lucky fellow you are, and what a jackpot we have won even before we were born, like an advance for our lives. On that note I hope that I will still be given numerous opportunities to return at least some part of this.”

There is hardly any more to say, except to ask you to stay at our side and to support these relief measures at the Horn of Africa. Thank you very much.

       humedica e. V.
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You can also support us in a fast, secure and simple way by means of sending a text message: send a text message containing the reference DOC to +49 8 11 90. You will make a donation of 5,- euros, with 4.83 euros of this amount being directly channelled into the humedica disaster relief projects.