Mom scouts out 12 new sites

Spoke with Mom today (through several calls due to poor reception). She is having a blast! I was able to ask her a bunch of questions this time. The summary of the overall effort is as follows:
- The campaign is for measles and targets 1,000,000 vaccinations.
- There are about 10 active sites at any one time.
- Each site does between 1,000 and 3,000 vaccinations each day
- There are 9 vaccination teams that rotate between sites
- The area to the south of her has already vaccinated over 300,000 people
- There are about 1,000 people involved in helping to pull off this monumental effort. This includes volunteers, drivers, MSF folks like Mom, etc.

So then we got a chance to talk about some of the stuff she has been doing. She says the roads are some of the worst she has seen. She characterized the one she was on when I was speaking with her as an ‘overgrown path’. There was also a bridge that was just wide enough for a car to fit, but no room to spare. She is where she says the tourists never go. Many of the places have no motorized vehicles at all. She is ‘way out in the bush’.

When she described the villages she said they are a lot like the remote AK villages with people living off the land. Every time she goes into a town there are people lined up on both sides of the road going to or from the town. Many are women and children. They are carrying groceries, water, etc. To carry the water the women balance 5 gallon buckets full of water on their heads and children 2 ½ gallon buckets on their heads. Water is 8 pounds per gallons, so that is heavy. She says this practice does produce people with excellent posture. They also walk at a even but slow pace all of the time…again due to the times they have to carry water where you cannot go very fast.

For Mom the day starts at 5 AM and ends around 10 PM. Evidently this is not typical, although someone else there has worked 48 days straight. One of the docs said since this is an emergency campaign, it is very fast paced and busy. He said when Mom goes to Uganda it will be very different since that is an established, ongoing clinic. It will be a slower pace and much more routine.

For the villagers, the day starts at 7 AM with washing, cooking, etc. They sweep their dirt floors of their houses. Mom says everyone is extremely friendly waving as she passes by. They do not see visitors. Mom says they have the most amazingly white teeth. We discussed that is probably because they do not have processed foods, cokes, etc.

Mom said the locals have a limited diet. Again they are eating off the land. The basic staples are potatoes, rice (with tomatoes), veggies, greens, chicken and beef. Each meal is some variation of this. Mom and others did go to a restaurant and the menu was those items plus a pizza and a few sandwiches.

Well that is it for now. More to come as I know more…