Hospital
The Need
AS a kid did you ever get free healthcare? I did. Think of a third world country that spends one-third of its GDP on paying off JUST the interest alone of its foreign loans/debt. Where is the budget for healthcare?
Nick Kristoff said it best; that the change in America's mortality rates was led by access to healthcare. In America we have hundreds of well stocked kids hospitals. No public kids hospitals in East Africa, none. The child mortality rate has risen by 24.7% instead of declining (the hopes of MDG #4).
80% of kids who die in Kenya do so without ever seeing a healthcare provider. Two thirds of those deaths are treatable/preventable IF the kids have access!
One in six kids are dying in Sub Saharan Africa before getting the chance to celebrate their fifth birthday...
Most foundations/charities are telling us "Sorry, we do not fund bricks & mortar" but this is exactly why this travesty exists.
If you fund raise in the name of Africa, PLEASE, listen to what the African people want; and I can promise you it is not another conference, think-tank, benefit dinner costing a six figure sum... it is simple, they want basic public healthcare for their children. Briana of Eldoret, "Your pets in America get better healthcare than our children do..." I had no reply for that one.
A Plan For Change
Donated public land? YES. Running costs covered? YES. Doctors & Nurses waiting to start? YES. A partner hospital to run the place? YES. A huge outreach? YES (catchment area of millions). A partner to run the medical teacher training? YES. Sustainability plan? YES (Sister adults hospital 100-meters away has been running off this plan since 1917). Minister of Medical Services backs this? YES.
Has anyone donated serious money to the team who will be handling the construction & management? YES - (The Gates Foundation, PEPFAR & USAID have collectively donated millions upon millions of dollars). Good accessibility? YES (International airport, good trunk roads very close by).
This is an exciting, innovative, and, I believe, the most likely solution to addressing today the travesty of the high child mortality rates in East Africa.
WHAT WILL BE ACHIEVED BY THIS PROJECT?
Hundreds of thousands of kids will, for the first time, get access to a Kid's public hospital. By building the infrastructure of good health in Africa you are giving the continent its best chance to reverse the trend of poverty. Hundreds of Africans will also get training, per year, that they will take to their district hospitals, their part of Africa, and bit by bit pediatric healthcare will have a presence in Africa.
This project is so affordable, do-able, and happening that there is no reason why we should not clone this method and in the future reach all the countries in Sub Saharan Africa.
Toby Tanser, Founder/CEO
How Can You Help?
The truth of the matter is it takes cash. I have been told 'we don't fund bricks and mortar' so many times by large foundations & charities but that is not a solution, that would not have helped when the man who dreamed of Harvard wanted to start an institution to teach... to save a child you need the hospital.
To date no one has given me a better realistic plan to change the terrible stats you can read to the left, no body has said, 'Here is a more effective way that we are now working on..."
If you send even $10 that is bricks in the wall... and it is your name in immortality as someone who stood up and helped make this happen— Think globally! Your donation will go 100% to the cause - we do not take a dime!
