Help us build a community health centre in Mwanya village

Mwanya village, located on the banks of the Lomami River, is an isolated rural community with a population of about 5000 people. Being one of only a handful of villages with a makeshift designated health centre hut in the Kabongo territory, Mwanya has become the primary health centre for all the surrounding villages, serving more than 50 villages; with some of the villagers travelling as far as 100 km to be seen by the one and only village nurse, who is not only unpaid, but has little to no resources at hand.

With the village lacking money, the nurse is forced to treat villagers with single-use medical equipment; using 1 and the only disposable syringe, on multiple patients. Having only 5 wooden bed frames with no mattress, patients often are treated and examined on the floor. Not only does the lack of medical equipment complicate the provision of urgently needed health assistance, the absence of electricity and lack of money to purchase oil for oil lamps, nor batteries for the artificial lights, requires the nurse to work in sometimes pitch-dark conditions.

“There is no light, there is no money to buy the batteries for the light… with no light… we have to deliver babies in the dark sometimes, there is nothing we can do.”

– Magie Maloba Wa Nkulu, the village nurse.

These conditions coupled with the lack of health and hygiene education in the Mwanya village and surrounding region, is the cause of many preventable deaths. We want to change this.

We want to build a bigger and cleaner clinic for the village, and equip it with medical instruments, and proper beds, and importantly light. We also want to make sure that the centre has a designated health education area, where assemblies and talks can be held on hygiene, sanitation and self-care, because we believe that eradicating ignorance is a step towards eradicating illnesses.

Help us build a much-needed health centre in Mwanya.