Up in Mokhotlong!

Yesterday I went with the visiting Boston University pediatrician and a couple of my colleagues out to Mokhotlong to visit the 'Touching Tiny Lives' home where orphans, abandoned children, and children who are severely malnourished are taken for short and long-term care. Mokhotlong is a town perched way up in the Drakensberg Mountain range not that far from Sani Pass (approx. 3600 meters above sea level!) and in the middle of winter (which is right now!) is COLD! Getting to the town itself is a bit of a trek and requires a 5 hour drive through some pretty hair raising switchbacks and mountain passes that can get very icy during this time of year. After we got to the home we were given a tour around the facilities, met the children, and talked to the caretakers. Quite an impressive place (www.touchingtinylives.org) and organization.

The reason we were there in the first place is that Maluti (the hospital at which I'm based) is trying to put together a proposal to start a creche for orpans and abandoned children from our area. We already have 4 children in our pediatric ward who have been abandoned by their extended families because their parents have either died (mostly from HIV/AIDS) or abandoned the children, so the need is there it's just finding the resources and staffing to make it work which seems to be the problem. Another proposal that I'm working on involves establishing an HIV/AIDS pediatric prevention, treatment, and care center of excellence where children from the Maluti Health Service area (approx. 300 sq km) can come and recieve treatment without having to go into Maseru. It would be fantastic if we could establish a small center in this health service area where the increasing incidence of HIV/AIDS in children is alarming.

Well, beyond these two projects I am still running the CHIME project, working on my own community research, and desperately trying to write as much of my dissertation as possible over the next 5 months before I leave. The superintendent has offered me a stipend to stay on until March but I feel that I need to leave, even if it's only me going to write my dissertation in Cape Town or get another job in Lesotho or South Africa, just to provide some closure for myself.