The Sudan Medical Link: Robin Sadler

The talk at the Recital Room at Dumpton School, Wimborne, will chart Robin’s visit which was designed to report back on the funds being training midwives, clinical officers and laboratory technicians as well as assessing Primary Health Care Clinics, medicine requirements and networking with Pharmaceutical Representatives.

In Kampala he was able to meet the directors of two different pharmaceutical companies and attempted to bargain with each! He also visited the Kajo Keji Health Training Institute that has moved to Arua in Northern Uganda because of insecurity in South Sudan where students had been killed. He stayed with one of the students the Medical Link was supporting.

Thanks to MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship) he was able to fly to Maridi then Yambio without going via Juba. He visited Tito at Maridi Bethsaida Clinic, with whom the Medical Link has had a long relationship, and also interviewed three potential candidates for training as clinical officers. He saw a student just qualified at AMREF training school whom the Link had supported. He had discussions with Bishop Moses, who is coming to the new Bishops Course in Canterbury in February, and then visiting Salisbury.

Time spent after that with Bishop Samuel in Nzara was very valuable as Robin saw $12,000 worth of drugs delivered by air intact and safely to the Good Samaritan Clinic. Soon road delivery should be possible. He gave a three-hour talk on nutrition to 150 Mothers Union representatives and learnt a lot in the process! This would not have been possible without the help of the lead nutritionist at Poole Hospital.

He spent time discussing training and interviewing six potential candidates, some gaining work experience at Mother Teresa Hospital less than two miles from the ECSS (Episcopal Church of South Sudan) cathedral and clinic. Sister Laura at the hospital was most helpful and as a result there will be increased cooperation in the future, which can only be good for the health care around Nzara.

Together with Bishop Samuel and his new lovely wife Aida he visited Ian Paterson, managing director of the Equatorial Teak Company. Ian’s support of projects around Nzara and St Timothy’s School has been invaluable. The school is enlarging all the time and now has nearly 1,000 pupils and much building is under way. Robin was able to take messages and some ‘Kits for Girls’ from Pewsey.

Robin has said he felt very safe throughout his time in South Sudan and thanks so many people for their prayers and gifts for the people there. He gave money for clothes and footballs as well as cement for Church foundations. Money was given for internet connection (it costs Nzara $300 per month for this) as well as individual gifts for travel, especially to students in Arua wanting to return home for Christmas.

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