Health

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Health

In Sumba basic health services are deficient or non-existent. Most Sumbanese must walk five miles or more to get to a government clinic that often will not have the medicines needed to help. In the remote areas of Sumba there are no clinics within a half days walk or more. Many of the government clinics do not have reliable medical supplies or equipment. It really is a desperate situation.

More than half of the Sumbanese children under the age of 5 suffer from malnutrition and anemia due to poor diets making them more susceptible to disease. Tragically in some areas an estimated 30% of the children die before the age of eight of preventable and curable illness.

We are committed to providing improved healthcare for the Sumbanese people. We are doing this by building and operating our own primary care medical and malaria clinics. We also work closely with the government midwife clinics that are stationed in the most remote areas. We provide them with equipment and our doctor helps them improve their skills. We are also continually striving to strengthen the government’s capacity to deliver better healthcare via improved infrastructure and provision of medical supplies and equipment. Through our partnership with Direct Relief International we delivered more than 15 tons of supplies and equipment to three hospitals and 16 government clinics enabling them to better serve their people.

The Foundation’s work in the health sector deals with a variety of needs, these are: the provision of water, providing health services and medical supplies, the rehabilitation of government midwife clinics and the construction of our own medical clinics, and dealing with food security and malnutrition.

All of our five clinics have been strategically placed about 2 to 3 miles apart to allow for reasonable access for the sick coming from villages nearby. We employ 13 Sumbanese nurses and 1 doctor at our clinics that have a reputation as being the very best in the area.

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