FREETOWN, SIERRA LEONE – In our communities, breastfeeding continues to play a vital role in improving maternal, newborn and child health (MNCH). In Sierra Leone, United Methodist health facilities have observed remarkable benefits resulting from increased awareness and practice of exclusive breastfeeding.

Pastors and Imams speak from the pulpit and in the mosque telling men that a father’s role is important too. If we support women, the children will grow strong. Our MNCH data shows a noticeable decline in malnutrition among infants under six months of age, which we attribute largely to increased exclusive breastfeeding rates.

Through health education, peer support and community outreach, more families are embracing breastfeeding as both a natural practice and a lifesaving intervention.

Breastfed infants in our catchment communities are showing stronger growth, fewer cases of diarrhea and respiratory infections, and overall better immune responses compared to those who are partially or not breastfed.

Mothers who breastfeed exclusively often experience quicker recovery after childbirth. Our reports indicate reduced postpartum bleeding, faster uterine contraction, and emotional bonding that contributes to mental well-being are other benefits of breastfeeding. Mothers may find it useful as a means of family planning, and they engage regularly in clinic visits, health education sessions, and child welfare monitoring, reinforcing the continuum of care.

We have seen a steady improvement in attendance and outcomes at our well-baby clinics. Mothers who breastfeed always bring their children for regular growth monitoring, immunizations and nutritional counseling. This has created a stronger connection between families and United Methodist health services, fostering trust and long-term participation in child health programs.

Catherine Norman is the Health Board Coordinator for United Methodist health facilities in the Sierra Leone Conference.

Global Health

Global Ministries provides a way to support United Methodist health facilities and the medical personnel who help to create sustainable support systems for women who choose to breastfeed their babies through the first six months of life.

In honor of World Breastfeeding Week, give to Abundant Health.

The post The impact of breastfeeding in Sierra Leone appeared first on Global Ministries.

By Christie R. House
April 27, 2022 | ATLANTA

Teresa Cassua has battled malaria most of her life. She’s cared for family members who contracted the disease and often got sick herself. In her community near the Quessua health facility in East Angola, mosquitoes are difficult to escape during the rainy seasons, when the larvae hatch and the ravenous insects constantly bite.

“I want to start by thanking the team for helping me and my community,” Cassua said to the program evaluator. “Last year, my family suffered several cases of malaria. Now, with the United Methodist Imagine No Malaria campaign, we’ve learned how to get rid of pools of stagnant water, clear bushes from around our houses and remove solid waste to reduce the presence of mosquitoes nearby.”

She was impressed by the patient Quessua United Methodist youth volunteers who shared information about how malaria is spread and the importance of sleeping under mosquito nets every night. She even decided to talk to her son about taking the training and joining the team.   

Angola ranks as one of the 10 most affected countries for malaria cases and deaths in the world (World Health Organization 2020 World Malaria Report). It is the primary cause of mortality, as well as 35% of the demand for medical services and 40% of hospital admissions. The United Methodist Health Board of East Angola has steadfastly worked on prevention of, treatment for and community education about malaria since its formation in 2011.

Dr. Leo Garcia, a missionary, medical doctor and pastor working with the Quessua health facility, has helped to train local facilitators – youth, young adults, community leaders and church leaders – who fan out into the villages to share what they’ve learned in group presentations. Sometimes they also go door-to-door to reach more people.

Their campaigns have good success rates, reaching almost 25,000 people in the nine communities that surround the Quessua mission. Garcia says they have seen an increase in pregnant women coming to receive prenatal care, including intermittent preventative treatment (IPT) of malaria, periodic doses of preventive medicines that reduce the presence of the parasite that causes malaria. IPT improves birth rates and the health of mothers and newborn babies.

The number of patients has increased to the point that sometimes the staff at Quessua has trouble keeping up, but recently, the addition of a mobile clinic has meant that health services can be administered in the communities, relieving some of the burden at the Quessua health facility.

Dr. Garcia’s wife, Cleivy Benitez, who is also a doctor and theological teacher, leads some of the mobile clinic teams. She discovered places where children were showing signs of severe malnutrition, another factor that weakens the immune system and increases the likelihood of serious and fatal malaria cases.

Quessua therefore developed a program to track malnutrition in the communities and provide monthly food supplements to families whose children need the extra nutrition.

The educational methods designed to train facilitators for malaria prevention can also be used with different curriculum to train for COVID-19 prevention. The East Angola Health Board has developed this training program as well, with some of the same facilitators.

Teresa Cassua mentioned some of the real changes she has seen as her community chose to come together to prevent mosquitoes from spreading the malaria parasite. In addition to cleaning up their environment, 92% of the patients coming to the health facility for malaria are coming earlier, with onset of their first symptoms. Bed nets are now being hung properly and used effectively in households rather than being used as fishing nets and garden covers.

Cassua commented on the passion with which the United Methodist volunteers shared their knowledge in her community. “They really love helping us change our lives to improve the whole community,” she said.

Global Ministries supplied a major grant to East Angola for its Imagine No Malaria Campaign. Chicosseno Salvador, East Angola’s program manager for malaria, coordinated the implementation with Quessua staff.

Consider a gift to Imagine No Malaria. Community by community, efforts continue to eradicate the disease and the suffering it causes worldwide.

Christie R. House is a consultant writer and editor with Global Ministries and UMCOR.

The post Reducing malaria by increasing community awareness appeared first on Global Ministries.

By Philippe Kituka Lolonga
Jan. 27, 2022 | BUKAVU, Congo (UM News)

For more than three years, The United Methodist Church has fed over 1,000 malnourished children in Bukavu, Kisangani, Kindu and Tunda. 

The effort — part of the Maternal and Child Health Program in East Congo — has been getting financial support from the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries’ Global Health program since 2016.

Regional violence has rendered fields inaccessible, and families have left rural areas, putting children’s health at risk. 

Gisele Bitembu, 40, and her eight children live in the area of United Methodist Irambo Hospital in Bukavu. “Three of my children,” she said, “presented severe malnutrition in 2019. Today, with the support of the church, my three children (have) come to recover their normal health.” 

Likewise, five of Adrienne Aksanti’s six children suffered from malnutrition. Today, they are thriving. 

“In January 2020,” she said, “I had lost hope, but today the church has changed the state of health of my children.”

Dr. Marie Claire Manafundu, program officer for the East Congo mother-child health program and wife of East Congo Area Bishop Gabriel Yemba Unda, leads the effort. 

Children receive porridge three days a week at the feeding sites.

“We also made medicines available to health centers to take care of these malnourished children whose health was critical,” Manafundu said.

She said the program works with community relays and the church’s UMConnect messaging platform to make people aware of the support and to encourage them to continue follow-up care.

Aksanti said she appreciates the reminders to take her children to the health center for porridge and medicine. 

Masika Ndongo, a midwife, supervises treatment of malnourished children at the Irambo health center. “We receive new cases of malnourished children every day,” she said, adding that the staff does everything in its power to help children recover quickly.

“I work in collaboration with the community relays, who go household by household to sensitize parents and pregnant women to respect their appointments,” Ndongo said.

Daniel Dunia Runinga, mayor of the Ibanda municipality, expressed gratitude to The United Methodist Church as a reliable partner supporting the Congolese government in various programs.

Leonard Shako Telonga, a nurse at the Majengo United Methodist Health Center in Goma, praised the UMConnect text alerts, a program of United Methodist Communications. “It has enabled us to raise awareness among parents and pregnant women in various health areas in eastern Congo,” he said.

“After the Nyiragongo volcano erupted,” Telonga added, “we had several malnourished children in the Majengo health area in Goma. Most of them were abandoned, and today the church is starting to take care of them.”

Dr. Jimmy Kasongo, who works at Irambo Hospital, said people living with HIV and AIDS also continue to benefit from financial support from the mission agency’s Global Health program.

“We have mentored more than 100 persons living with HIV,” he said. “We sensitize them so that they understand that there is always a continuity of life, even if they are HIV positive. Each month, the patients receive antiviral medications and a nutritional plan.”

According to data from the latest UNAIDS report, roughly half a million people are living with HIV in Congo. 

“People living with HIV or AIDS have the same rights as other people and deserve our full attention so that they are not marginalized in society,” Manafundu said. 

Bishop Unda said he is grateful to Global Ministries for supporting health programs that are part of the church’s action plan in his area.

“I congratulate all those involved in this great work of taking care of malnourished children, pregnant women and people living with HIV and AIDS,” Unda said. “We preach the word of God, but we also have an obligation to maintain the physical health of our devotees.” 

Kituka Lolonga is a communicator in the Kivu Conference.

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By Nan McCurdy
December 6, 2021 | Mexico

By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Luke 1:78-79 NRSV

The light of God takes many forms at the Give Ye Them to Eat (GYTTE) center in Puebla, Mexico. As we prepare again to receive the light of Jesus in the short, dark days of the year, we also remember the many ways God has accompanied us along the way, at times lighting a flame that spreads beyond GYTTE into small villages and up winding paths into the mountains in the state of Puebla and other states of the Southeast Methodist Conference of Mexico.

We see light dawning in many of GTTYE’s programs as people learn ecological ways to grow nutritional foods, draw clean water from the earth and build dry composting toilets, wood-saving stoves and earthquake resistant dwellings with natural materials.

We also see the light growing as women learn about how their bodies function in order to promote health as well as recognize and help prevent disease in their communities.

This year, 11 women graduated as Health Promotors from our community health program. Graduation means the women have successfully completed three courses taken over 18 months, each course covering about 25 topics. We offered the third advanced course this past September. The women should have graduated a year ago, but COVID-19 has changed life for all of us. One woman, Elvira from Oaxaca, graduated nearly 20 years after her second course. She is a successful leader and specializes in encouraging villagers to give up drinking sodas and start saving. Another woman, Faviola had a huge goiter removed when she should have taken her Advanced course. She was thrilled to finally graduate.

The Indigenous people in Mexico are generally relegated to remote areas. We are very pleased that five Indigenous women, from both Totonac and Nahuatl tribes and who still speak these languages, will be better prepared to serve their villages in promoting health. Among the graduates was Ocotlan, a Nahuatl woman from a village in the mountains of Cuetzalan, seven hours from Puebla. She is a leader and a specialist in natural medicine who taught natural medicine in the first course.

These courses were taught in a participative fashion. Topics covered were: reproductive systems, menstruation, pregnancy, delivery, the post-partum period, family planning, prevention of sexually transmitted illnesses, HIV-AIDS, breast and cervical-uterine cancers, prevention of gender violence, heart disease, taking pulse and blood pressure, menopause, andropause, prostate cancer and more.

One of the ways the women process what they learn is through presenting social dramas. It’s easy to see what they have learned, and the dramas are both tender and funny. We keep boxes of men’s and women’s clothes and they “play” their parts.

Along with using their knowledge from the three courses with family, neighbors, churches and friends to monitor high blood pressure, or diabetes, or care for a cut, wound or burn or give an injection, the women also teach different health classes.

It was really an honor to be with the women for a week in their learning process. Yes, we see God’s light surrounding us in many ways. We await the dawn of Christ, coming to us again as Zechariah predicted, guiding our feet into the way of peace.

Gracious God we thank you for the light you send to lead us in the ways of peace. May we offer our knowledge and experience freely to others who seek to build peaceful and healthy communities, so that more people may experience the abundance of life Christ offers every day.

Nan McCurdy and Miguel Mairena are a missionary couple serving with Give Ye Them to Eat in Puebla, Mexico. McCurdy served the people of Nicaragua as a missionary from 1985 to 2014 and she and Miguel worked for 20 years with women and youth through the Women and Community Association in San Francisco Libre prior to their assignment with GYTTE.

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In DRC and beyond, United Methodists seek solutions on multiple fronts to decrease the transmission and grip of HIV and AIDS.

By Christie House
December 1, 2021 | ATLANTA

In Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of the Congo, some teenage girls must drop out of school because their families can no longer afford to support their education. The United Methodist Church in the South Congo Annual Conference has reached out to this vulnerable population. While the young women do not yet have the skill-set or education to find work, once outside their families they are vulnerable to rape and sex trafficking. Some become pregnant and do not know where to turn. In this population, HIV and AIDS and other kinds of sexually-transmitted diseases are prevalent.

This year, World AIDS Day focuses on inequities such as severe poverty and the resulting lack of access to education and health services that make some populations more vulnerable to HIV and AIDS. A grant from the United Methodist Global AIDS Fund is currently assisting the South Congo Annual Conference to train unemployed young single mothers in skills and trades so they can become self−supporting and live with dignity. 

Through Global Health, HIV-testing is made available to all pregnant mothers who seek health services from supported United Methodist facilities and programs across Africa. For those testing positive, anti-retroviral drugs may improve the mother’s health and chances of survival and prevent mother-to-baby transmission of HIV. Whether promoting direct health interventions like this or addressing the social conditions that leave certain populations at risk, such as in South Congo, United Methodists seek solutions on multiple fronts to decrease the transmission and grip of HIV and AIDS.

On World AIDS Day, join Global Ministries in prayer and work to support meaningful action to ensure inclusion, equity, and better health for all people affected by HIV and AIDS. Give to Advance #982345.

Christie House is a writer and editor consultant for Global Ministries and UMCOR.

The post World AIDS Day: Eliminate inequality to eliminate HIV and AIDS appeared first on Global Ministries.

World Breastfeeding Week, August 1-7

August 2, 2021 | ATLANTA

The United Methodist Church’s Abundant Health Initiative promotes physical, emotional and spiritual well-being for all. In sub-Saharan Africa, Global Ministries’ Global Health unit focuses particularly on abundant health for pregnant women, mothers and young children in economically vulnerable communities. This World Breastfeeding Week let’s remember that breastfeeding is an invaluable part of health for both mother and child.  

1. Mothers breastfeed their newborns within an hour of their delivery.

All mothers giving birth at Abundant Health facilities are taught best care for their newborns, including breastfeeding. In Nigeria, staff and community health workers at Gwandum, Worom, Bambuka and Nahuta health centers help mothers to breastfeed with an hour of giving birth. This not only provides perfect nutrition and protection for each newborn, but essential warmth and emotional bonding. It is special work because there are some communities with strong traditional values and customs that don’t naturally support this practice.

2. For best health and growth, infants are exclusively breastfed for their first six months.

Exclusive breastfeeding is hard work, especially for mothers who farm their land, manage a small business, work for others or are living in insecure parts of a country. It’s serious work for women in Sierra Leone, where malnutrition is increasingly common, even in very young children.

3. Breastfeeding protects infants from childhood diseases.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, pregnant women and new mothers are taught at UMC health centers and in the community that their breast milk contains everything needed for their children’s healthy growth and development. This includes protection from common, life-threatening infections, like pneumonia and diarrhea.

4. Breast milk is available, safe and affordable.

In Liberia, where the Abundant Health facilities, markets and surrounding villages are not connected by good roads or markets, mothers know that their breast milk is prepared and safe. However, it also means that mothers need to be well nourished for their own good health.

5. Breastfeeding also benefits mothers.

In all Abundant Health projects, women are encouraged to breastfeed for their own well-being. Breastfeeding supports bonding with their children, helps the family economy as formula milk is expensive and often not easy to prepare correctly, acts as a contraceptive under specific conditions, and reduces the risk of postpartum hemorrhage and depression, type II diabetes, and breast and ovarian cancer.

The post Protecting breastfeeding – a shared responsibility appeared first on Global Ministries.

By Christie R. House 
April 23, 2021 | ATLANTA 

Two-year-old Aminata and her father arrived at the Hatfield Archer Memorial Methodist Hospital in Rotofunk, Sierra Leone, at midnight. Her breathing was shallow and rapid, and she was feverish, weak and pale.

“I was surprised to see a father playing a mother’s role,” noted the community health officer, Mohsen M. Lumeh, since most children arrive with their mothers. Testing and lab work revealed the baby had a complicated case of malaria and a secondary diagnosis of severe anemia. Lumeh ordered a blood transfusion, placed Aminata on oxygen and started her on antimalarial drugs immediately.

In just a week, Aminata fully recovered. At check-out, her father asked for the bill, but the cashier replied, “the bill has been settled by Imagine No Malaria.” The father left the hospital in amazement with a broad smile. Often, people wait too long to seek medical help because they fear receiving medical bills they can’t pay.

Scenes like this in Sierra Leone are repeated across Africa every day at United Methodist hospitals and clinics. Though malaria, a parasite carried from one person to the next by mosquitos, can be deadly if left untreated, it can be killed with proper treatment. Preventive measures go a long way in protecting communities from constant exposure.

World Malaria Day, April 25, celebrates the successes in the fight against malaria and urges countries, leaders and communities to do more to reach a malaria-free world.

Today, more than 400,000 people die from malaria each year; the majority are African children under five years of age. In fact, 90% of malaria cases occur in Sub-Saharan Africa, where The United Methodist Church has concentrated its Imagine No Malaria program.

Imagine No Malaria, set in motion by the 2008 General Conference as a partnership between United Methodist Communications and the United Methodist Committee on Relief, is funded by donations from United Methodists of all ages and affiliations. The United Methodist Church was the first faith-based partner of The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the largest international public-/private-funding source for health programs. INM programming is currently coordinated through Global Ministries’ Global Health unit, which focuses on strengthening facilities and assisting the UMC health boards. Comprehensive malaria programs include raising awareness about malaria, training health workers, providing supplies (including nets, medication, and test kits) and working to upgrade medical facilities.

Global Health integrates the work of INM with its Mother, Newborn and Child Health program to reach vulnerable children and their mothers, even before the children are born, when mothers come for prenatal visits. The two programs work with Global Health’s third emphasis, Health System Strengthening, to fill in gaps experienced by health facilities, such as older buildings, clean water access and sanitation.

United Methodist Health Boards in ten episcopal areas – Burundi, East Angola, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe, and the four areas of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (East Congo, Central Congo, South Congo and North Katanga) – each have an INM coordinator and work with Global Health to design programs relevant to their contexts.

Roland Fernandes, the general secretary for Global Ministries and UMCOR, has followed the transition and development of United Methodist health facilities during his years with the agency: “We’ve partnered with annual conferences in Africa to strengthen their health boards for more than a decade in order to enable their work through health care facilities and hospitals to treat and prevent malaria and meet other health needs. We are grateful to the health boards and the conferences they represent for their dedicated work to maintain and improve health services for everyone.

Just as Aminata in Sierra Leone survived because her father got her to the hospital in time, Amelia Toe, five months pregnant, received the medication she needed at John Dean Town Clinic in Liberia. Her path to the clinic was paved by her daughter, who attended the UMC school in John Dean Town, where the UM health board supported regular health education and malaria prevention sessions provided by the clinic. When her daughter (also named Amelia) visited home on the weekend, she found her mother gravely ill and in danger of losing her baby.

Though Toe had visited the nearest clinic, she received a prescription for medication she could not afford. Her daughter convinced her to make the trip to John Dean Town Clinic, where she knew her mother would receive help and medication whether or not she could pay. The four-hour trip was made in a hammock, but after a week at the clinic, Amelia Toe recovered. “I thank God for the doctor woman who went to the school to teach our children about malaria and all the sickness,” she said.

In addition to teaching in schools, INM in Liberia develops radio spots in its catchments areas, conducts community outreach with mobile clinics in market places and visits town hall meetings with women groups, youth groups, mission station directors and traditional leaders. In Burundi, similar outreach is conducted in schools and pastors receive training to disseminate information through congregations.

Health workers at Quessua Hospital in East Angola have increased awareness of malaria prevention measures by visiting communities. Patient intake is rising, more people are using nets and deaths from malaria have decreased.

In Central Congo last year, the INM office extended its educational program to work with 20 traditional healers to identify signs of malaria and refer cases to health facilities. “To date, statistics from United Methodist health facilities confirm that more than 286 patients have been referred by traditional healers to our care establishments,” noted Dr. Samy Longanga, Central Congo’s INM coordinator.

One of those traditional healers, Catherine Tshabilonda, said: “I now understand that the majority of children who died under traditional treatment had a serious malaria problem. I continue to be a traditional healer in my neighborhood, but if I receive patients with fever, headache or other signs of malaria, I now advise them to go to the Nganza UMC Health Center where I took my grandson for malaria treatment.”

Delivery of medicines, nets and other supplies to United Methodist facilities is a vital part of INM, which takes complicated logistical coordination, particularly during rainy seasons when roads are often impassable. Unfortunately, that is also when mosquitos breed.

The North Katanga area has tackled this problem by hiring massive trucks with huge tires. This gets the supplies to the major facilities and pick-up points. However, the rest of the journey to the rural clinics must be completed by motorcycles.

Somehow, the deliveries are made. Lorraine Charinda, an agriculturist missionary in North Katanga, thanks God every day for this work. She says in the three years she has served with Kamisamba Farm, she’s had malaria more times than she can count. “This

is the worst place for insects. Malaria cases are very high, and people cannot afford the medicine, which Imagine No Malaria supplies for free. Without Imagine No Malaria, there would be many dead here. So, I really appreciate that work.”

One way of commemorating World Malaria Day is to make a gift to Global Health to continue the life-saving legacy of Imagine No Malaria. 

Christie R. House is a consultant writer and editor for Global Ministries and UMCOR.

The post Still thanking God for Imagine No Malaria appeared first on Global Ministries.

The United Methodist Abundant Health Initiative reaches and exceeds its 1 million children goal…and keeps going 

By Christie R. House 

January 21, 2021 | ATLANTA 

Mrs. Rose O. and her husband conceived three times in their marriage, but Rose lost every baby during her 5th or 6th month of pregnancy after suffering with a high fever. “When I announced to my husband that I had conceived for the fourth time,” she explained, “he sent me back to my family because, according to him, the problem was purely family genetics, and that my family would have to correct it. He said I had no need to visit a health center, as I had done that with the other three pregnancies and it didn’t help.” 

In fact, Rose’s husband forbade her to go to a health center for any examination or treatment because he was sure her parents would have the knowledge to remedy the situation. At heart, he didn’t want to lose another child any more than she did, and they were both concerned and did not know how to proceed. Another loss would be devastating. 

But while she was staying with her family, Rose was introduced to a group of nurses and community health workers from the United Methodist Diengenga Maternity Center who were visiting her parents’ community to reach young pregnant mothers like her. They were well aware of the common causes of miscarriage and the danger signs for pregnant women. 

“I took courage and decided to participate in their prenatal classes from that day on,” Rose said. “I went clandestinely to the Diengenga Health Center to start my prenatal sessions.” 

Rose received medicine for malaria, antibiotics for infections and prenatal vitamins during her four appointments. She faithfully recorded the course of her pregnancy in her visit book and she experienced an uncomplicated delivery. 

“My heart is filled with joy holding our new baby boy, delivered right here at the Diengenga Maternity Center. The problem was not genetics, as my husband believed,” said Rose. “When my family announced to my husband that I had given birth, my husband joined me directly at the Diengenga Health Center. He was overjoyed and even organized a big party for me.” 

That beautiful, healthy baby delivered in the United Methodist Diengenga Maternity Center in the Democratic Republic of the Congo was one of the more than one million children reached through the United Methodist Abundant Health Initiative during the last four years. 

Since the launch of the Abundant Health Initiative in 2017, Global Ministries has invested more than $26 million in 50 countries and mobilized millions more in partner in-kind contributions to reach 1 million children and adolescents with health interventions in thousands of communities across Asia, Africa, North America and Latin America. Global Ministries’ staff evaluates monthly data collected from United Methodist health centers across the globe, like the Diengenga Maternity Center. By understanding the “big picture” based on data carefully recorded by trained health professionals, the Global Health unit can design comprehensive interventions to fill the gaps in service that, left unchecked, lead to ill health and death for children and babies. 

In 2017, Global Ministries joined the United Nations-sponsored Every Woman Every Child Initiative, which aimed to reach 16 million children by 2020. This initiative is supported by government, private sector, nonprofit and faith-based organizations committed to realizing healthier, more productive futures for children, their families and communities across the world. 

And while statistical data collection and evaluation and participation in a United Nations initiative is impressive, it is the enduring trust and relationships forged by United Methodist health workers and volunteers, like the nurses and community health workers Rose met in Diengenga, that are the backbone that makes the whole initiative successful. 

Denise Mondji, the Central Congo Mother, Newborn, Child Health (MNCH) coordinator for the Central Congo Conference of The United Methodist Church is a nurse-midwife. Her work is so well respected that, at the last Pan-African United Methodist Health meeting, she was selected as the best MNCH coordinator on the Abundant Health team. 

She connects well with community leaders and health workers. They are currently working together on a nutritional rehabilitation program – screening, treating and feeding children back to health. They use a porridge made from grain together with fresh produce that parents can grow themselves or find in the market. At the same time, there is training in nutrition for everyone. These interventions are making a sustainable difference in children’s lives, although more is needed. Malnutrition is a major concern. 

“I love, admire and respect these women,” Kathleen Griffith, interim Global Health team lead and program manager for MNCH with Global Ministries, said of the MNCH coordinators. “Getting the community involved is an important component. Another positive way of improving pregnant women’s access to services is though the establishment of mothers’ waiting homes at health facilities. In some cases, it may take a mother many hours of walking to reach a clinic. Pregnant women stay in the waiting home for several days or weeks before their due date. One of these was opened in Central Congo recently last year.” 

Griffith described another ingenious way that a MNCH coordinator devised to fill a gap in in service for expectant mothers. 

Joyce Madanga, another nurse-midwife, is the MNCH Coordinator for the United Methodist Health Board in Nigeria. Like Denise, she is trusted by the communities she serves. “A significant service gap was that many pregnant women were attending their first prenatal visit but very few were coming for their fourth. This concerned us,” Griffith said. “What was happening?” 

The health centers are in rural areas where transportation is limited and expensive. Women cannot afford to make multiple prenatal visits. So, Madanga met with the local taxi union. They signed a Memorandum of Understanding agreeing to transport pregnant women, especially those with emergencies, to the health facilities, which would pay for the service. It became a win-win situation. 

Reaching the goal of 1 million life-saving interventions to meet Abundant Health’s commitment to the “Every Woman, Every Child Initiative” was a rewarding milestone for Global Ministries and the United Methodist health boards, but babies like Rose’s little boy – they are the best reward for all involved. He is one in a million, precious in God’s sight, and he likely would not have been born without the intervention of The United Methodist Church health workers in Diengenga. 

Gifts to the Abundant Health Initiative, Advance # 3021770, will make it possible to reach more children and their families this year. 

Christie R. House is a consultant writer and editor with Global Ministries and UMCOR.

The post One in a million appeared first on Global Ministries.

Photo by Jill Evans.

By Linda Bloom
Nov. 13, 2020 | UM News

In a year when one disaster seemed to follow another, the United Methodist Committee on Relief’s longtime investment into the training and support of church members who respond — both in the U.S. and globally — is paying off.

As directors of UMCOR and its parent agency, the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries, learned during their annual meetings, UMCOR currently is working 38 active grants of $19 million in the U.S. and has supported responses to 99 unique emergencies so far in 2020.

“If that sounds like a large number, it is,” said Lara Martin, interim director of U.S. disaster response for UMCOR.

The pandemic was both a complicating factor and “a silver lining” as online presentations were perfected for disaster response training events at the conference level. In the end, UMCOR was able to conduct 72 mostly remote trainings that reached 1,287 individuals, Martin told the relief agency’s directors during their Oct. 28 virtual meeting.

Two other significant milestones were announced Oct. 28, then celebrated at the Nov. 12 meeting of Global Ministries’ board of directors.

The denomination’s Abundant Health campaign, led by the Global Health unit of Global Ministries, exceeded its goal of reaching 1 million children with lifesaving interventions between 2016 and 2020. “Through the support of our donors, partners, and board members, we reached 1,075,732 children by the end of September 2020,” the Global Health report said.

Affiliated with the United Nations program, “Every Woman Every Child: The Global Strategy for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescent’s Health,” the Abundant Health campaign focused on communities, primarily in Africa, with high child mortality rates from preventable causes.

An Africa agricultural program is in development, a follow-up to the first-of-its-kind agricultural summit in January 2019 sponsored by Global Ministries and UMCOR, with representatives from all African countries where The United Methodist Church is in mission.

During that summit, Sierra Leone Bishop John K. Yambasu, vice president of Global Ministries, said the church in Africa has the potential of becoming self-sustaining if it develops its vast land into viable commercial enterprises.

Yambasu died tragically in an August car accident and the program will be named in his honor. An initial agricultural grant of $300,000 for Sierra Leone is expected to be approved at the December UMCOR board meeting.

The mission agency’s work in disaster relief, health and sustainability continues even in the face of budget cuts and staff reductions over the past few years.
 
The Asian tsunami in late 2004 and Hurricane Katrina in the U.S. in 2005 generated $110 million in donations for UMCOR’s response. But that level of funding has changed, said Roland Fernandes, top executive for Global Ministries and UMCOR.
 
“There’s been a decline in income, that’s one reality we’ve got to face,” he said during the Oct. 28 meeting, where UMCOR directors approved $1.15 million in new grants and authorized $6.4 million in disbursements.
 
In the U.S., the largest disaster response grant was $370,000 to the Alabama-West Florida Conference for its response to the damage left by Hurricane Sally in September.

As with many U.S. disasters, Emergency Response Teams were the first outside volunteers to assist with United Methodist relief work in Alabama-West Florida. The South Carolina Conference, for example, sent an ERT team each week from Sept. 21-25 and Sept. 28-Oct. 2.

The project using the UMCOR grant will focus on unmet home repair needs in rural Marlow, an unincorporated community near Fish River, Alabama, in south Baldwin County, which has a large Hispanic population. In total, 37 households will receive reconstruction assistance.

United Methodist churches near Marlow have supported the initial hurricane response by providing food, toiletries and cleaning supplies and serving more than 300 hot meals daily.

However, the combined effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, the continuing long-term recovery of Hurricane Michael, widespread damage from Sally “and the unprecedented number of disasters” means that contractors will be hired to complete much of the repair and rebuilding work. 

The conference does hope to recruit and safely house volunteer teams in an attempt to assist an additional 26 households.

A total of $180,978 was approved for large international disaster response grants, including $81,605 to the Davao Episcopal Area disaster management office to mitigate the risk of flooding. The constructing of four pedestrian bridges will allow residents of Barangay Lamlahakby in Mindanao, Philippines, to safely evacuate and remain connected to essential services.

That pedestrian bridge project is an example of the type of international mitigation programing that UMCOR hopes to expand in 2021, said Katie Hills Uzoka, senior manager for international disaster response. 

Overall, her unit awarded 35 grants in 16 countries this year, totaling more than $2.9 million, and closing 21 completed projects, she said. “A majority of our responses have been to cyclones and flooding,” she added.

Directors approved $607,040 in Global Health grants in Africa for Imagine No Malaria, maternal and child health and the strengthening of United Methodist health systems.

Also in 2020, the Sheltering in Love Rapid Response program for COVID-19 relief provided over $2.3 million in 230 grants in 54 episcopal areas, 43 countries and 43 U.S. states and territories. 

Migration continues to be a focus for The United Methodist Church and to illustrate that work, the Rev. Jack Amick used a “gaps, maps and light” approach that also allows for flexibility in a time of pandemic.

The “maps” part includes a framework for providing goods and services in different locations — on either side of the U.S.-Mexico border; in Latin American countries where churches have set up ministries to assist migrants; or even in a refugee camp in South Sudan. It also can mean, where possible, helping transport migrants or displaced persons to connect them with relatives.

Ministry to migrants has continued during the pandemic, but sometimes “in ways they didn’t expect,” Amick said in an interview with UM News. In some cases, churches have set up ministries to assist migrants who have then had to stay and quarantine.

Changes by the U.S. government related to asylum-seekers and the U.S. public health mandate to close its borders — leaving “thousands of people to be stuck in really bad conditions in Mexico” — has had an impact on migrant ministries near the border, Amick noted.

A ministry in the Rio Grande Valley “is retooling to find ways they can help undocumented people in their area,” while services at the border are suspended, he said. That might include identifying people who would benefit from skills development and helping them attend community college.

Other examples of retooling to fill gaps include helping church-related shelters for asylum seekers on the U.S side of the border retain staff and capacity and buying a commercial refrigerator for fresh vegetables for the Holding Institute, a United Methodist Women national mission institution in Laredo, Texas.

An UMCOR grant to Church World Service is providing “light” as it supports a call system for information for asylum seekers. In recent months, Amick explained, the call system has become a COVID hotline for undocumented immigrants seeking advice or translation help about services available to them.

Justice for Our Neighbors — a United Methodist-related program that provides immigrants and asylum-seekers with legal assistance — also has kept its work going during the pandemic

Executive director Rob Rutland-Brown told UMCOR directors that new sites in Lexington, Kentucky, and Fayetteville, North Carolina, were opened in 2020. The program currently is working with teams planning new locations in the Delaware Valley and Texas. 

Bloom is the assistant news editor for United Methodist News Service and is based in New York.

Follow her at https://twitter.com/umcscribe or contact her at 615-742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org. To read more United Methodist news, subscribe to the free daily or weekly digests.

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FOR RELEASE: IMMEDIATE

Dan Curran for Global Ministries

770-658-9586, DanCurran@CurranPR.com

Mary Lou Greenwood Boice Director of Communications, Global Ministries

404-788-0624, mboice@umcmission.org

Working to positively impact the lives of women and children around the world, Abundant Health, The United Methodist Church’s global health initiative, has achieved and exceeded its goal of reaching 1 million children with lifesaving interventions by 2020. According to data reports, the United Methodist contribution to the global effort to end preventable deaths of newborns, children and adolescents reached 1,075,732 children as of October 2020.

Naomi Lebbie, a young woman from Southern Province, Sierra Leone, became a hardworking petty trader although her hope had been to be a teacher. Naomi married young and her first two babies died – one at the hands of a traditional birth attendant and the second she miscarried. It was during her third pregnancy that an outreach team from the Jaiama Health Center, a United Methodist facility focusing on maternal, newborn and child health, visited her village. She enrolled in its prenatal program and, when she developed complications, did not hesitate to stay there for care. A few weeks later, Naomi gave birth to a healthy son. “My dream of becoming a mother has come to reality,” she said.

Since the launch of the Abundant Health Initiative in 2017, United Methodist Global Ministries has invested over $26 million in 50 countries and mobilized millions in partner in-kind contributions, reaching over 1 million children and adolescents with health interventions in thousands of communities across Asia, Africa, North America and Central America. Data from around the world, collected monthly and evaluated each quarter, enables the Global Health unit to provide more comprehensive interventions in response to current challenges.

The United Methodist Church recognizes that every child is filled with promise and potential. Its mission to protect children from preventable causes of death and disease aligns with global efforts. As a sign of its commitment, Global Ministries joined the United Nations-sponsored Every Woman Every Child initiative originally designed to reach 16 million children by 2020. This initiative is supported by government, private sector, nonprofit and faith-based organizations who are committed to realizing healthier, more productive futures for children, their families and communities across the world.

Abundant Health focuses on five core areas impacting the health of children throughout the world: ensure safe births, address nutritional challenges, promote breastfeeding, advance prevention and treatment of childhood diseases and promote children’s health and wholeness.

“As United Methodists, we find care and concern for children rooted in our Social Principles, where we talk about putting children and their families first,” said Roland Fernandes, general secretary (chief executive) of United Methodist Global Ministries, the worldwide mission and development agency of the denomination. “Back in 2016, the General Conference affirmed that children have the right to food, shelter, clothing, health care and emotional well-being, as do adults, and these rights are theirs regardless of actions or inactions of their parents or guardians.

“Through Abundant Health, we are promoting the physical, spiritual, mental and emotional health of children worldwide,” Fernandes continued. “The initiative’s name is derived from the Gospel of John 10:10: ‘I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.’ We are committed to living into our promise to children by imagining abundant health for every child in every place.”

“We go to places where there is no one else, where no one else wants to go,” Interim Global Health team lead and program manager for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health,” Kathleen Griffith said. “When I think of the impact of Abundant Health, I think of the women like Naomi who had a successful pregnancy, people who walk three hours to get to a clinic and the mothers who work so hard to bring their children for immunizations.”

She added, “What is inspiring to me about the Abundant Health Initiative is that so many more children are now more likely to survive their fifth birthday; more children are thriving through healthy meals, substance-use prevention and positive youth development programs. Our support has improved the quality of care for mothers and babies in some of the most challenged places in the world.

“Through the initiative, we help people learn that in order for a child to be healthy, it takes more than prescriptions, more than staff in a hospital,” Griffith said. ‘It takes a holistic community response.”

“Our assistance to improve provider capacity and strengthen health systems has helped revitalize UMC mission hospitals and clinics in many low-income countries,” noted Bishop Thomas J. Bickerton, chair of the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR). “Clearly, when we harness our efforts across the global UMC network, we make enormous progress toward our shared goals. Our continued success depends on unwavering commitment to effective, equitable and sustainable child health service delivery strategies so that children not only survive but also thrive as they grow into their adult life.”

Approved at the 2016 UMC General Conference, the initiative builds on the success of Imagine No Malaria, the United Methodist health initiative that significantly reduced the number of childhood deaths caused by malaria.

According to Global Ministries’ leaders, the motivation to launch the Abundant Health Initiative emerged in part from an extensive survey of people in 59 countries. Data showed that the top global health challenges are maternal and child health, water and sanitation, hunger and nutrition, and access to health care.

Global Ministries leaders are available upon request for interviews about Abundant Health.

Donations to support the program are being accepted at https://advance.umcmission.org/p-490-abundant-health.aspx.

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Global Ministries is the worldwide mission and development agency of The United Methodist Church. Founded in 1819, Global Ministries today supports more than 300 missionaries in over 70 countries, including the United States. It has personnel, projects, and partners in 115 countries. Learn more about Global Ministries by visiting www.umcmission.org or by following www.facebook.com/globalministries and twitter.com/umcmission.

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