Uganda: the WECARE humanitarian experience continues...

Again this year, as from the last 5 years, a group of health workers members of WECARE, has chosen to devote their Christmas holidays in favour of the weakest, spending them in north Uganda in a missionary hospital. And with the usual lightness and irresponsibility that by now characterizes us, we have prepared our suitcases that more than personal effects contained needed items to our new and old friends and we left for the African continent. And it is when you arrive at the airport that Africa embraces you with its cloak of humidity and with its strong odors, as if to hug you and to thank you for your return. After a long flight we expect another endless journey through the streets of the chaotic traffic, where you pass from the villas and gardens of Entebbe, to the improbable shacks of mud and metal of the suburbs, to the dignified North huts, where life flows slowly and haste is that human mistake that has not yet taken root. After a first experience in a missionary hospital in the suburbs of Kampala and after visiting other realities, we made another bet with ourselves and we approached on tiptoe this hospital where we tried to help the people, providing instrumental support as hospital beds, diagnostic equipment, X-ray equipment, material for surgeries, but above all trying to offer the benefit of our expertise acquired over many years of experience. Upon our arrival we noted with great pride that the material sentfew monthes ago with the container was put in place and in particular it permitted to put the hospital beds in the new wing built for the emergency, the beds for ambulatory activity are in the clinics, the colposcope and the ultrasound sent are functioning and used daily, while the radiological equipment is in the assembly phase and the lights of the operating room are still waiting to be mounted. The welcome is the same as always, affectionate, as if we had left the night before. In this hospital arrives everything from number of people with malaria, the disease that still kills more children in the world, to traumatized to the SIDA patients, to pregnant women but especially children. Activities never stop, 24 hours 24, 365 days a year in which we seeks to ensure water, electricity, medicines, professionalism and a little affection, a caress and a little optimism, because maybe tomorrow will be less stingy. Among the patients there are also diseases to us little known or admitted people who are in critical and often irreversible condition because they arrived late at the hospital after kilometers of walking trips or by makeshift equipment or because health facilities are unable to provide appropriate assistance. And the victims are often women such as those that suffer injuries from a complicated childbirth, or children, especially infants or very small, whose cry is often silent, as if they were already aware of a marked destiny. Anyway we exude a lively atmosphere of normality and also restart. In recent years in Uganda, thanks to the newfound peace after decades of civil wars, has stopped the spiral of war and famine, with an important increase in demographics, economic, technological and social indices. The economic improvement is palpable and current conditions favor the slow process of recovery and the desire of normality seems to prevail. The increase in life expectancy in one of the youngest populations in the world is translating into even greater demand for adequate health conditions. So we rolled up our sleeves and, day after day, our time has flown between the operating room, and the outpatient clinic, but also spending time among the people, living their daily lives and respecting their customs as we have always considered us to be guests. Our objective is above all to try to provide a few more tools to seek an increase in their own country and not to encourage voyages of hope that most often result in further despair. And it is from the smile of the dozens of children that we have known, from the strength of those who try to get by, not only for daily life but also for the hope of a tomorrow, looking for a dignity in nothing, that we have found the answer to the meaning of our sacrifices and we found our Africa, one where the energy is palpable and the hope for a tomorrow and where the determination for a better future is intimately linked to the desire to get back on top in the search for a decent future for themselves and for the future generations. However, I can not forget the face of a young girl suffering from terminal SIDA, which from its bed has asked to be photographed, without fear or shame, as if her last request wanted to be the testimony of a marked and hopeless destiny for her. Her image is certainly the biggest, silent thanks to what we have done, and the abyss of her look is definitely an invitation without words to the world so that it does not forget his people.

Bianca e Francesco

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