Last year we were asked by Paul Healy, the Director of Trócaire in Somalia, to help build a Tuberculosis ward in the town of Luuq. It was a great success and €28,482 was donated by you, the parishioners of this parish.
This Lent, Paul has again been in touch. He has described current conditions in Somalia, particularly the desperate drought crisis in Gedo and the numbers of people with extreme hunger is deeply alarming. Hundreds of thousands of livestock are already dead and over half a million people have moved to IDP (Internally Displaced Person, is a person who has been forced to move within their own country because of conflict or disaster) camps in regions such as Gedo where Trócaire provides key health and nutrition services.
They are doing all they can with the resources they have but it’s going to be a very rough year for millions of people in Somalia.
Paul has been in touch to ask for help to support another worthy cause in Somalia, this time the area is a town in Gedo called El Waq. Currently health services there are almost non-existent. Mothers with any complications related to delivering their babies have to go across the border into Kenya if they and their babies are to have any chance of survival.
In Pauls words:
“Our intention this year, should we have the funding is to establish CEMOC services (complicated emergency obstetric care), refurbish the health facility and build a delivery ward that can manage deliveries in the district of El Waq. We know we can do this with support and hope that we will have funding to include El Waq in our health services for the coming few years. Support from Rathfarnham would kick start this and make a big difference”.
To help raise the much needed funds for this special collection there are collection envelopes at the back of the Church. They can be left into the Sacristy, the Presbytery or the Parish Office. Your generosity would be greatly appreciated.