Greetings from South Carolina! Fall is in the air, the trees are changing color, and the weather has been great. It is a crazy time for us as we have been busy making preparations for our departure on October 27th back to Chad. We have been making last-minute phone calls, packing suitcases, ordering medical supplies, having meetings, and visiting with friends and family.
Our time in the States has been quite different than other furloughs, but also a time of rest, reconnecting with family and friends by phone, and social distancing. We have been able to spend more time with Philippe, Brenna, Joel, and Jenny than we have in years! It has been a great blessing during this difficult COVID 19 time.
The highlight of our time in the States was Joël and Jenny’s beautiful wedding on October 10th in Johnson City, Tennessee. Unfortunately, Heidi, Petter and the children were unable to attend due to travel restrictions. Hurricane DeIta and COVID 19 did not damper the mood and it was such a joyous occasion to see the two take their vows before God and man. A night to remember full of joy and laughter! Please pray for them as they embark on this new journey we call marriage!
We continue to praise the Lord that the number of COVID cases in Chad have remained relatively low and that all staff members at the hospital have remained COVID free! We are looking forward to being with and working with the staff soon. Our amazing team at Guinebor 2 Hospital continues to keep busy.
Let us tell you about a case, unfortunately not unusual! “Moussa” (not his real name) is a thirteen years old boy who was brought to the hospital by his parents because he broke his right arm and left leg in a motorcycle accident.
The family, being poor, thought it would be easier and cheaper to take Moussa to a traditional healer who bound up Moussa’s arm tightly.
Unfortunately, the dressing was much too tight causing the arm to lose its blood supply, and the arm became gangrenous.
The parents, who had originally asked the traditional healer to help them, decided it was making their son worse so they brought him to Guinebor 2 Hospital. They had noted that there was a bad smell coming from the arm.
Kalbassou and the staff were able to set the child’s left leg without any problem, but were not so fortunate with his right arm because the arm had developed gangrene and a bone infection. The only solution was to amputate it above his elbow.
Because of generous gifts given to the hospital’s “Poor Fund” by friends around the world, the family was helped with their bill and were so grateful for Moussa’s care and financial help! Pray for this family that they will be touched by Christ’s love because of the care they received at the hospital!
We are so looking forward to getting back to Chad and being with our staff and missionary friends again, but it will be hard to say goodbye to family and friends.
We want to thank each of you who has helped us with prayer, financial gifts and other ways of encouragement during our prolonged stay here in the States! We had intended to be here for about 5 months post-Bert’s total knee, however, because of COVID, another unexpected major surgery, and various health-related complications, we have now been here for almost 9 months. We will be returning on October 27th.
We thank you for continuing to pray for:
1. Bert’s health,
2. Our trip back to Chad (with lots of luggage),
3. That no problems would arise with customs in Chad because of all the supplies and equipment we are transporting for the hospital, and
4. The readaptation to the October/November heat and dust as the rains have ended the beginning of October.
Prior to leaving the States, we are required to have a negative COVID test. Upon arrival in Chad, we are required to quarantine the first week, repeat our COVID test on day six with a negative COVID result before we are released to go back to work at the hospital.
Thanks for your continued prayers and financial support. Without you as “our team” we couldn’t continue our ministry for the Lord in Chad!
Although the covid 19 pandemic has, mercifully, been less severe here in Chad than in many other countries, it continues to make its presence felt, primarily through the heightened economic pressure it has placed upon an already very poor country.
Here at the hospital, the prices of many of our consumable products have continued to rise, and their availability to decline, while the capacity of our patients to pay for the goods and services we provide them has reduced.
Keeping our pharmacy well stocked is becoming more and more of a challenge and, now that the generous COVID 19 relief grants we received from BMS, CEF, SIM-France, and through individual supporters via CHSC, have all finished, we’re facing acute financial challenges.
To make matters worse, the hospital recently – and in our opinion unjustly – lost a court case which had been running against us through different levels of the legal and appeals system for almost two years. This resulted in a substantial fine and the demand to pay it within 8 days.
We managed to pay the first half to keep the bailiffs from the door (the plaintiff is well connected and had access to the power to seize assets if we refused to pay), and have negotiated some delay on paying the remainder, which God has provided for through a generous individual donation. However, even paying that first half was a big hit for the hospital which functions on very tight margins at the best of times, without the means to save for such eventualities, and in a country without viable insurance protection.
The hospital management team has been wrestling with the tri-fold challenges of rising prices for drugs and consumable supplies, reduced numbers of patients (partly seasonal during these heavy rains, partly due to COVID 19 and its socio-economic impacts), and the fact that most patients would not be able to afford it if we increased the prices we charge them.
To prevent continual stress around paying for pharmacy and lab bills, we want to establish a “revolving drugs fund” whereby all revenue from pharmacy sales and lab tests is set aside specifically to pay for laboratory reagents and pharmacy bills (these amount to more than $15,000 / €13,500 / £12,000 each month).
In order to do this, we first need a cash injection to do a major re-stock of both our lab and pharmacy – the latter most urgently, as we’re starting to run out of many drugs including those desperately needed for malaria.
We also have pressing material needs, such as replacing the 16 solar batteries in our main building (we just managed to replace the 8 in our wards in August), which are almost dead, meaning that the lights go out soon after 5pm in our 24/7 pharmacy, and the fridges in the lab and pharmacy lose power, unless we run the generator at night and burn more fuel.
We know that times are difficult for everyone right now, but if there is any way that you can help us to meet these urgent needs then that would really help us to keep treating all the patients who come here.
Our international church in N’Djamena has been studying the book of Acts recently, and we are reminded that when progress is being made for God’s kingdom it often meets with opposition.
We’ve been blessed to see much progress this year at G2, but we are now also feeling the pressure of that opposition, through the court case, the increased security risk, and our financial challenges. We need God’s grace to persevere through it so that our labors for him will be sustained and continue to bear fruit.
The Team at G2:
G2 hospital has always attracted a mixture of long and short-term mission workers, in addition to our core team of Chadian staff.
We have recently been blessed with a real answer to prayer in the form of an obstetrician/gynecologist. Dr. Claudia Wahl was already serving in Chad through the German mission agency Christliche Fachkräfte International (CFI) and will now be working with the maternity department at G2 until the end of 2021.
Maternal and infant mortality remains one of Chad’s many big health challenges and so we are very glad to welcome her skills and her contribution to the team here at G2. May God bless all her efforts!
After many months of school closures, it’s been a blessing that the two international schools re-opened in late September. As well as being good news for all the G2 mission children, this has also freed up their parents to work more at the hospital.
In particular, Bizunesh and Genet, the wives of our two Ethiopian pastors, are now ministering alongside their husbands here at the hospital, which is a real boost to sharing the Gospel here, especially for our female patients in this very gender-orientated culture.
We’ve also experienced the potential of our new football/soccer field for use in outreach ministry to local boys, although, unfortunately, the combination of the ongoing COVID 19 pandemic and recently heightened security situation has meant that developing this exciting new ministry is on hold again for now.
When working in Chad, it seems that steps forward can often be followed by steps backward, which can be discouraging, but we will keep persevering.
Lives Transformed at G2 Hospital:
After the intensely dry hot season, the rains that start in June are very welcome indeed. The air cools and the landscape rapidly transforms from a barren desert into lush green grassland.
It does not take long however before much of the area around the hospital becomes flooded. Not only does this see some roads become impassable and others much more challenging, but the cases of malaria increase relentlessly through July, August, and September.
This affects every age group, but we see all too readily that it is often the children who are more severely affected. Amina* is one such child. [*Name changed to protect her identity.]
Amina* & her mother, after successful treatment for severe malaria. [*Name changed to protect her identity.]
Amina is 10 years old and was brought into the hospital at the beginning of September, having been comatose already for 3 days.
Her malaria test was positive, and she was admitted for treatment in the pediatric ward with daily injections and IV fluids. The malaria parasite destroyed her red blood cells and caused her to become anemic. Thus, she needed blood transfusions. And as she was unable to eat, we also started feeding her through a tube into the stomach.
Each day we saw a small amount of progress until finally after 7 days of being in hospital, she opened her eyes for the first time.
All of the staff who had been caring for her were delighted to see the amazing recovery that she made. The photo above was taken another 4 days later. She was still a little weak, but able to walk, and she replied with a smile when we asked if she was ready to go home.
See & Learn more about G2 Hospital:
BMS World Mission made an excellent short video about the work here at G2 hospital. If you haven’t seen it yet, then please watch the “Operation Chad” film. Watch it here.
We are still in urgent need of a Surgeon. If you have these skills and are willing to serve, whether long or short term, then please do contact us at Guinebor2@gmail.com
Please pray for our financial situation. By the grace of God, we have kept the doors open and staff paid through the last 6 months, but bills and needs continue to mount without respite.
Pray for journey mercies for our staff coming into work and the children who live here going out to school each day. Three months of heavy rain has severely deteriorated our un-surfaced/dirt access road and made getting in and out of the hospital an endurance test for people and vehicles alike. Our ambulance was stuck in mud for two hours recently with vital oxygen bottles and vaccines in it.
Continue to pray for strength for Kalbassou, our General Director, who has also been our only surgeon for the last seven months, working almost ceaselessly.
Pray also for the safe return from the USA of our founder and surgeon, Dr. Bert Oubre, and his wife Debbie, due back in Chad later this month.
Please pray God’s protection over this hospital and this country, not only through the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic, but also against the increased threat from Boko Haram, who have become much more active in closely neighbouring Nigeria and Cameroon, and are also present here in central Chad.
Keep praying for the work of our two Ethiopian pastors/chaplains and their wives, and for all those they are reaching here with the Gospel.
G2 Hospital is very grateful for all the volunteers, prayers and financial support we receive from all over the world, including from AIM, DWAM, Encompass World Partners, Humedica, CFI, CHSC, SIM-France, CEF, BMS World Mission, and individual private donors and churches. We could not keep doing what we do without your ongoing support.
May the Lord continue to bless you in all that you do!
Do not be anxious about anything, but inevery situation, by prayer and petition withthanksgiving, present your requests to God.And the peace of God, which transcends allunderstanding, will guard your hearts and yourminds in Christ Jesus.
