Gundua Health Centre celebrates its first anniversary!

Posted on by
Reply

This week it was exactly one year since Gundua Health Centre opened and received its first patients.It’s amazing how time flies. The one-year old will be duly celebrated of course. We invited everyone we wanted to meet; representatives from the District Health Government, people from the neighbouring large farms who we would like to offer retainer contracts, the Swedish Ambassador (who unfortunately was busy elsewhere), the new Buuri MP Kinoti Gatobu, contacts and friends at other hospitals and clinics, media as well as the most influential people from the different villages around Ex-Lewa. We decided to run the clinic as usual, seeing patients and celebrating at the same time. After several discussions,it was agreed that our MP would arrive on Friday the 5th around 10 AM. His presence would make it easier for us to get others to come, everyone is so eager to meet this new promising minister. We put up our balloons, poured reflexes and condoms in large baskets, put up our new sign and proceeded to wait for our prominent guest. Four media companies were on site – tv, radio and two newspapers– MP Kinoti had participated in a radio interview the previous evening and talked about his visit to Gundua. Time passed, no MP. Two journalists started to interview me about Gundua Health Centre, so we got that out of the way. Finally, however, he arrived with a large group of people and everything could get started. The first thing we did was to walk around the centre and show him the facilities. Everyone was impressed by the high standard and how nice the clinic looks, especially our modern lab and the delivery room. We then had a ceremony led by Chief Helen, great as always. Students from Gundua Secondary together with the Gundua Parent Dancers presented us with a fantastic show and we were all invited to dance with them. I gave a speech about our vision for the Gundua Health Centre – to create better health opportunities for children, teenagers and inhabitants in Ex-Lewa by increasing awareness about basic personal hygiene and by providing modern and affordable healthcare to the needy. The following morning I could hear myself speak on the national news summary on the radio, and the reporter saying how grateful and happy the people of Ex-Lewa are for the health clinic. We could not have gotten better advertising.

The owner of one of the big rose farms, who we hadn’t previously met, arrived and was duly impressed. We immediately agreed to work together, which is exactly what the clinic needs. The MP as well as the representative for the District Health Governmentpraised our health clinic and we finished off with a good discussion with the MP about both the clinic and especially our school. We would like to put some pressure to ensure that the teachers we are paying for should instead become the responsibility of the Kenyan government. The rain naturally poured in time for food, but it did not matter and we are all looking forward to an exciting second year for Gundua Health Centre.

Grants at Gundua Secondary

Posted on by
Reply

A while ago we celebrated the great results generated by the last year students at Gundua Secondary. During the three years that the school has graduated form 4-students, we have gone from 4.9 the fist year, to 6.0 last year and to 7.59 this year in average grades, corresponding to B-. 13 students of 41 are directly qualified for University education with subsidized dues. Another 25 have qualified for higher education. This year we had no students with D+ or worse. Gundua Secondary is now the third best day school in all of Meru-county, and on 14th place of totally 500 schools in the area. There are many reasons for this success. One is the great infrastructure we now have in place. Good school buildings, equipment, benches, canteen, teacher’s quarters etc. form a stable platform. Competent and engaged teachers are an absolute must. We have a great team in place who support each other and who like working together. A pedagogic approach combining the more traditional learning with modern thoughts about individual learning has contributed to the success. An openness and familiarity between teachers and students have had a positive influence. The introduction of the Gundua Grant with last years’ Grant Fellow now attending University has inspired the students to work even harder. So it is a positive spiral. Next year we will have even more textbooks and computers thanks to generous donations and this will hopefully generate even better results. The headmaster, teachers and students have set the target to reach 8.5 next year, and this is absolutely within reach.

The celebration started a bit hesitantly. We had invited the young (26 years) newly appointed MP, Kinoti Gatobu, from the Buuri district, who had promised to arrive at 10. By 12.30 I had given up, but everyone else was happy and positive so we started the ceremony without him. Students and teachers gathered in the canteen to sing, dance and perform theatre. The MP finally arrived close to 1.30 PM to great cheers form the audience. The celebration intensified. The MP himself joined the dance and the cheers increased even more.
There were several speeches and then the MP helped me to hand out this year’s Gundua Grants to our three best students; Walter Ogeti, Duncan Aritho and James Nduati. All three of themwill get the opportunity to continue their studies at University level with the support from the Gundua Foundation. The MP then gave a speech about the importance of focusing on studies to get a better life. He himself is a perfect example; from very poor conditions he became Kenya’s best student during all of his school time and he is now the youngest member of the parliament that Kenya ever had.

After the celebration we had some food and tea together with the MP. He was very interested in Gundua and we decided to meet soon again to discuss a wider cooperation between the government and the Gundua Foundation. All in all it was a very rewarding day. We wish to congratulate our Grant Fellows Walter, Duncan and James and wish them best of luck with their future studies!

Pharmacist visiting

Posted on by
Reply

Last weekend we had new visitors from one of our main sponsors, Apotek Hjärtat. It is always such a treat. Annika Svedberg, pharmaceutical and quality manager, arrived together with the pharmacists Daniel and Maria sponsored by Apotek Hjärtat’s own Gundua Health Centre project. Travelling with them, were Billy, a consultant to Apotek Hjärtat, and Fredrik, a free-lance filmproducer. One of the objectives of the trip was specifically to tell the story about Apotek Hjärtat’s engagement in Gundua using the film media. The film will be used both internally and as follow-up to the customer activity recently undertaken by Apotek Hjärtat for the benefit of Gundua.

We had chosen two families with small children willing to participate in the film in order to show the environment we are working in as well as how exposed young children under five really are. The mortality rate for children under five is high in Kenya and Apotek Hjärtat wants to work to improve their opportunities for a better life together with the Gundua Foundation.

The recent customer activity that Apotek Hjärtat conducted to benefit the Gundua Foundation, raised the equivalent of SEK 130 000. A fantastic effort and I would like to take this opportunity to thank both Apotek Hjärtat and its customers! This gift will make a real difference among the children here, giving them access to vaccine and medicine at a reduced rate.

The three pharmacists were obviously very interested and curious to learn more about the Gundua Health Centre’s pharmacy. Our own pharmacist, Jackie, was bombarded with questions about the operation and we had a positive exchange of ideas and experiences. Maria, who is a certified HLR-instructor, held a much appreciated heart/lungsaving course for the employees of Gundua Health Centre and invited guests.

At the same time Annika was out filming the families and children. Everything went well and gave a good insight of the extent of the poverty and miserable living surrounding the children. We had time to visit a nearby state dispensary to get a feeling for the difference in standard and quality between the Gundua Health Centre and the local alternatives.

Before returning, we made a trip to a local school to hand out soap and water from Apotek Hjärtat and to show the children how to wash their hands. A simple, but very important, activity to reduce the risk of some of the most common illnesses among children, such as worms, diarrhoea, amoebae and even dysentery.

After an intensive weekend the whole team returned to Sweden. Proud, happy and enthusiastic that Apotek Hjärtat’s engagement in Gundua generates concrete results. Thanks again Annika, Daniel, Maria, Billy and Fredrik – it was great having you here!