This Is Perseverance

The virtue of the month at my son's school was perseverence. The accompanying handout had these words: "Remember the story of the little engine? Let that be our motto: 'I think I can. I think I can. I know I can!' With God's help, all things are possible. Never give up!" And also, Look at the examples of the saints. How many of them were quitters? None!"

Living and working in Haiti requires perseverance. The family of the woman in the picture above displayed much perseverance in getting her to the hospital. She has persevered to stay alive long enough to have grey hair.

John has made six trips to Haiti in the last 10 months. Last month, he arranged for the 143rd Haitian Hearts patient to travel to California for surgery. He found the patient pictured below in Cite Soleil. He's a three-year-old boy with a heart defect, an atrial septal defect (ASD) and John has been contacting people trying to find a hospital. Could this little guy be patient 144?

Perseverance.

The Price of Cholera

Meet Renaldo. I wish we could. He died this morning about an hour after this picture was taken. His mother is terribly sick with cholera and was too weak to even react when her son died.

Renaldo had been admitted to one of the Cholera Treatment Centers yesterday with diarrhea. The nurses said that he didn't look too badly. But he began vomiting this morning. Cholera can kill quickly.

God bless Renaldo and God help us.

Cholera: A Terrible Disease

"We found Radha lying on a thin blanket in her hut. Her body was twisted into a knot of pain. Her hair was wet, saturated with sweat, as was the pink sari she wore. The smell in the hut was terrible. . . (her) mother was trying to keep her clean, but Radha's fever rendered her incoherent and incontinent. She vomited again violently as we watched, and that provoked a new dribble of diarrhea. . . what kills people who are contaminated with the cholera bacterium is dehydration . . The word cholera comes from the Greek word kholera, meaning diarrhea. The diarrhea of the cholera sickness has a singularly vile smell, and you never get used to it."

I shuddered when I read the above passage, just a few months ago, from the novel Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts. The novel is based on Roberts' experiences in India. I remarked to John how horrible cholera sounds and he confirmed that it is.

Cholera hasn't occurred much in Haiti. Back in 1990 when I went to the country for the first time, the health department recommended many vaccinations (typhoid fever, hepatitis) for travel to Haiti but not cholera, though the vaccination was suggested for travel to other parts of the world. (Note: if I read the literature properly, for the last several years, cholera vaccinations have not been recommended for travelers going anywhere).

Things have changed in the last few days and now Haiti is battling this terrible scourge. Cholera can kill in hours. The loss of fluids causes extreme dehydration, which leads to dangerous electrolyte imbalances.

The treatment for cholera is Oral Rehydration Therapy (ORT), a solution of sugar, salt, and other minerals dissolved in water that is administered to patients to keep them from getting dehydrated. In time, the bacteria works its way out of the patient's system.

We hope and pray that the cholera is contained and does not spread to the camps or other places in Port-au-Prince.