The next arm of ministry I wanted to touch on in Bundibugyo is BundiNutrition. An extension of the Nyahuka Health Center, BundiNutrition is an outpatient program aimed at identifying children at high-risk for severe acute malnutrition, and getting them the help they need before they get to the point of having to be admitted to the health center. Numbers of patients in the health center have hit record highs over the past several months due to many factors that seem to "tip the scales" for those children who are on the brink of severe malnutrition. Any number of factors such as a brutal dry season, a terrible economy, co-morbid illnesses such as HIV, malaria, or sickle-cell disease, could mean life or death for many children in the area. If we can identify these children and get them the help they need before their situation becomes severe, many lives can be saved without extensive medical treatment. More importantly, relationships can be built with the mothers of these children, who are impacting the future generation of Uganda and Bundibugyo. Our hope is that God would use these relationships to not only change the physical climate of the area in which we serve, but the spiritual climate as well!
So, how do we do that?
At one point in time, BundiNutrition was a huge umbrella that had several different projects concurrently taking place underneath it to meet the many complex health needs in the area. I hesitate to even touch on its' history because I will inevitably leave lots of details out and fail to give credit to the many hands that have served over the years. So, if you are interested, you can check out all the previous projects HERE, which are categorized on the right-hand side bar. However, since our Bundi team has been in transition the last several years, many projects have had to be paused until there are more hands to pick them up again! Thanks to two of our teammates, Dr. Jessica Ankney and Chrissy Chippriano, BundiNutrition was restarted on July 10, 2012. With the help of a local Ugandan assistant, these girls hold clinic once a week outside the health center, in which children who have been identified as being "high-risk" are weighed and given nutritional supplements. Their caregiver is then given nutritional counseling, and a group Bible lesson is presented.
One thing we learned during our training at ECHO was that it is not good enough to just save lives. In all actuality, we could be crippling a community by making its residents dependent upon outside resources to meet their needs for daily living. If what we are doing can not become self-sustaining within the community, we must ask the question, "Is it worth doing?" If it is only putting a band-aid on something that will start bleeding again as soon as that band-aid is removed, how are we making lasting change that will affect not just current members of the community, but future generations to come? We believe the Bible has much to say about health and nutrition, and that God cares about the way we live our lives, not just spiritually but physically too! We are called to be good stewards of the land He has given us and to use His provision to nourish ourselves, our children, and our children's children. Our hope is that through the BundiNutrition program, not only will children be prevented from falling into severe acute malnutrtition and families be served who are in need, but that relationships would be built that will draw us and our Ugandan friends into a deeper relationship with our Creator and learn from His Word how to best live our lives for His glory!
*To get updates on the progress and happenings of the BundiNutrition Program, check out Chrissy's blog HERE.
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