Home visits in the villages.

Today we were going to go on Home visits in the village. We visit the HIV+ children, who have been in Amecet and are now re-settled at home. Today we were going to Serere, a district south of Soroti. We never leave early, there are always things to organise, people to talk with or issues to deal with. So it was almost 12 o'clock until we left.

The first child was baby Moses 3, I wrote about him in the Blog of 17/11/2010. Moses has been with us for over 3 months. He is now being cared for by his grandmother. But I was very concern for him, because Moses got brain damaged by his birth, he was at first a bit paralysed and couldn't suck a bottle. Now he is better, but he is blind and it is not sure if he will ever be able to walk. I was afraid he might not do well and he was now 3 weeks back in the village. The place of the grandmother was very far, but it was a beautiful ride, it was near the lake and there were mountains nearby. We even almost killed a monkey, which jumped out of a tree on the road, in front of our car. When we found the home of the grandmother (after asking several times) the little chairs came from everywhere, for us to sit on. They were very happy to see us, but we were more happy to see Moses!!! He had gained 700 gram!! He looked clean and nice, an old grandmother was sitting with him, they love him and they care for him. He is doing well. The whole family lives around, so there are many people who help caring for him. As you can see on the picture above. We talked for a little while with the family, gave milk money and porridge flour for Moses, and then we went on our way again.

To see Emmanuel, a boy of 10 years old who was in Amecet for 3 months and went back home just before Christmas. He is an orphan, HIV+ and on the ARV medicins and he lives with his sister (and uncles and aunti's), Emma is also doing well, we left a small food supplement and some soap for him behind. He was just going back to school, so we gave him a lift in our car. He was very proud to be brought to school, by a car!!!

The last one for today was Lucy, she is also 10 years old, an orphan and HIV+. She lives with her uncle and his wives. Last year she was started on the ARV medicins by an organization in the health centre nearby. I asked if I could see her medical book and her medicines. After checking everything I came to the conclusion that Lucy is not taking her medicines. She had 3 months of medicines in her container, while she should have left only for 12 days. Because on 28/3 she should go for new medicines. It is very dangerous to mess around with ARV medicines. We talked with the family and neighbours who came to see what was going on. We discovered that Lucy is the one who is managing the medicines by herself! A child of 10 who doesn't like to take medicines! After a lot of talking we found a neighbour who was also HIV+ and on ARVs, who was willing to managing Lucy's medicines. I wrote a report in the medical book for the nurse from the health centre to read. We pray that it will work out. We will go back to check on them again.

Because it had taken a lot of time, we couldn't visit more children, because the distances are far between them. You spend a lot of time driving over small roads, with holes and cows everywhere. We felt we used our afternoon well and it was good to see the children and encourage the families.