Supporting Child Health in South Sudan (SCHISS)

Here is an update from our amazing Act4You project, Supporting Child Health in South Sudan.

South Sudan is the world’s newest country, having gained independence from Sudan in 2011. Unfortunately, despite abundant natural resources, it is also the world’s poorest country (by GDP per capita) and has the highest rate of newborn mortality of any country on earth as well as some of the highest rates of maternal and infant mortality (World Population Review). Almost 2 million out of 12 million South Sudanese are internally displaced due to conflict or natural disasters (especially flooding) and the country currently hosts over half a million refugees, mainly from the conflict in Sudan (UNHCR). Nearly two thirds of the population are food insecure (World Food Programme) and the threat of renewed armed conflict is ever present.

Dr Nicci Maxwell is a paediatrician/neonatologist based in the capital, Juba. She works with Church Mission Society (based in the UK) and with ACROSS, a South Sudanese Christian NGO, to provide medical care as well as teaching and training for health workers in the national children’s hospital in Juba as well as in a nearby refugee camp. Sadly, the health service in South Sudan is in a very precarious state with staff not having received salaries for more than 2 years and many medicines, tests and treatments unavailable except to those with the means to pay extremely high prices for private care.

SCHISS exists as a fund to assist sick children and their families to obtain necessary medical care that they are unable to afford – from simple blood tests or medications that are beyond the means of the poorest families to more complex and expensive investigations like CT or MRI scans and even helping to support referrals to specialist (usually surgical) services which are not available in the country. Additionally, SCHISS supports the purchase of essential equipment to facilitate safe health care (oxygen regulators, pulse oximeters and even gloves and syringes) particularly for newborns in the busiest neonatal unit in Juba.

In just the past 6 months, SCHISS has assisted over 30 individual patients. K, is a 14 year old Sudanese girl, living in a refugee camp about 25km from Juba. She is an insulin dependent diabetic but unfortunately the UNHCR is not always able to provide her insulin on time. K now receives extra supplies of insulin and blood glucose test strips from Dr Nicci and SCHISS to ensure her diabetes is well managed, even in the tough conditions of the refugee camp. D was only 4 days old when he arrived at the neonatal unit at Juba’s children’s hospital and was diagnosed with meningitis. His young, single mum was unable to afford the two week course of strong antibiotics that was needed to help him get better, so SCHISS stepped in. F is a 3 month old with Down Syndrome. Her parents could not afford the $35 (35 US dollars) for an echocardiogram to assess her heart murmur. Help from SCHISS meant the scan could be done and she could be referred for a free surgical procedure though an overseas charity.

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Money from SCHISS has also helped to provide suitable uniforms for neonatal nurses who were working in their own clothes, which risked the spread of infection among their vulnerable patients. A supply of medications for the urgent treatment of seizures and malaria is now available on the neonatal unit to help any baby that arrives and needs them urgently, when previously a relative would have to find money and then go to a local pharmacy to try to find the appropriate drug, costing large amounts of money and wasting valuable time in the treatment of their child. Oxygen cylinders are vital in the care of many children in hospital but the regulators which allow the oxygen in the cylinder to be used for patient care had become damaged and dysfunctional after years of constant use. A gift from SCHISS facilitated the purchase of both regulators and oxygen tubing which were needed to get life-saving oxygen safely from the cylinders to the patients again.

Sadly it is impossible to help every sick child in South Sudan but by doing what we can, with what we have, for the child we see, SCHISS hopes to show the love of Christ to children and their families living in very difficult circumstances.

Please keep Supporting Child Health in South Sudan, and the amazing work they do, in your prayers. If you would like to donate to this project you can by going to 'Donate' and specifying 'SCHISS'. Thank you!