(Photo courtesy Blessings International)

As the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti is also plagued by economic, development and public health challenges. These issues mean Haiti, along with neighboring Dominican Republic, remains one of the few places left in the Caribbean where malaria runs rampant.

Debbie Lammert, is an RN and director of Blessings International’s Mobile Medical Clinic for orphans in Haiti. She explains, “There are not public health situations [or] control measures in place, so many people come down with malaria every year.”

What’s more, since malaria is easily treated, it gets less press. Then, add in a different viral threat, and monies earmarked for malaria campaigns get diverted. “The international media coverage of Zika has sort of overwhelmed things and so people aren’t talking as much about malaria, although it is still here and hasn’t gone away.”  The thing is, notes Lammert, while “Zika is an important virus and it needs to be addressed…Zika generally doesn’t kill and malaria does kill.”

Why is malaria such a problem?

Haiti’s 2010 earthquake created great places for mosquitoes to breed and spread the disease. When coupled with a weakened infrastructure, there were few tools available to resist either malaria or cholera. Yet, Haiti wants to eliminate malaria, one of the top five killers in the country, by the year 2020.

With a regular rainy season, prime breeding grounds, and few resources to combat the pests, what you get is a cyclical disaster. “We’re just now, the past couple of weeks, starting up for rainy season again. So, once again we’re starting to see many more mosquitoes, just within the past two weeks that I’ve been here. Of course, with that, more malaria–more of every kind of mosquito-borne illness.”

(Photo courtesy Blessings International)

Now, take the quake, the loss of life, the loss of jobs, and consider that hundreds of thousands of orphans were created by the disaster, according to UNICEF.  Lammert says the government was hard-pressed to find places for all the children. ”Many of these orphanages, they don’t have the money to be in a nice place, so they’ve got a thrown-together building…They’re generally in areas that are less-desirable areas, and those are the areas that are going to collect standing water and have a higher mosquito population.”

Lammert observes that children’s homes, orphanages, or any other areas where there’s a crowded living situation, seem to give rise to more malaria cases. ”The malaria itself is carried by the mosquitoes, and often, it’s a mosquito that’s bitten someone else that carries the malaria to you. So, by the very fact of living in situations that are group situations, the risk of transmitting malaria is quite a bit higher.”

Into this context comes Blessings’ Haiti Challenge, and your chance to make a difference.

The Haiti Challenge

(Photo courtesy Blessings International)

Today, in recognition of World Malaria Day, Blessings International is partnering with Kairos 10 to give away anti-malaria medicine to any team ordering it during the months of April or May.

To find out details on this offer, click here.

Blessings also encourages you to consider ordering jewelry from Kairos 10. As part of this offer, anyone who orders a jewelry with Kairos 10 will not only be providing a treated anti-mosquito bed net to someone who needs it, but also a full course of anti-malarial medicine. The bed nets are in short supply, adds Lammert. “Currently, I’m in need of about 300, but soon we’re going to need a thousand.

“The orphan medical clinic project is a new program and it’s one that is growing. As we see more kids and more orphanages, of course, that’s going to be a big need for us, as well.”

She goes on to explain that her team looks for small Haitian orphanages to partner with, because they want to make sure that their kids don’t fall through the cracks. “These are often the ‘grassroots’ kind of Haitian people. Often, they’re pastors, and the vast majority of them are motivated to take in the orphans because of their love for Christ.” It’s a long-term commitment that they don’t take lightly, adds Lammert.

“We come, not just as someone who is going to hand things out to them, but as someone that is going to partner with them to further the body of Christ by raising these kids to know Christ.”

(Photo courtesy Kairos 10)

Malaria is a serious disease caused by a parasite that commonly infects a certain type of mosquito which feeds on humans.  The World Health Organization reports most deaths occur among children living in Africa, where a child dies every minute from malaria. This disease is preventable and curable.  The solution is simple: a mosquito net.  A net can be bought in America for about $20 but costs a Ghanaian one week’s wages.

If a product could be sold, then the proceeds could be used to buy mosquito nets to be sent to an underdeveloped country. The idea was birthed and Kairos 10 jewelry would be the vehicle. Kairos 10 co-founder Kathryn Pennington says, “Kairos is a Greek word and it means ‘God’s provision’ or ‘God’s appointed time’.”

Now that the co-founders had the idea and a business plan in place, it was time to find the pieces. Pennington says, “Ghana, West Africa is very famous for glass beads that they make from recycled glass bottles. We could buy the beads and hire women there in Ghana to make the jewelry.”

(Photo courtesy Kairos 10)

Kairos 10 then pays Ghanaian women four times the minimum daily wage to make the jewelry.  African fabric is purchased, and a local woman is paid to sew gift bags for the jewelry.

The result: “We were employing the women so that they could be self-sufficient and then we were also giving women in the United States a beautiful piece of jewelry, that then, in turn, (makes me want to cry) to a bed net that then saves a child’s life.”

The idea to build on each other’s vision and strength was a no-brainer. For Kairos 10, says Pennington, “Since October 2010, with our first sale, we have been able to purchase over 42-thousand mosquito nets.” Blessings also provides one course of anti-malarial treatment to go along with each bed net.

Here’s the Gospel angle:  Blessings makes these supplies available to Christian medical mission teams, emergency relief teams, dental teams and others providing critical medical services. Kairos 10 uses bed nets as the entry point,” but also to be able to say that ‘we love you enough to bring you a bed net. But Christ loves you enough to die on the Cross for you.”

(Photo courtesy Kairos 10)

Together, they’re resourcing the Gospel-sharers to be the hands and feet of Christ to areas of the world where the need is greatest. Adds Pennington, “Pray for the message to get about Jesus Christ, because that’s really the only hope for real, true change that occurs inside someone, that then manifests itself, externally, to others.”

Countries that have received mosquito nets from Kairos 10 sales through October 2014 are Ghana, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Indonesia, and India.

Progress in fighting this deadly disease has been made. Yet still, a child in Africa dies every minute from malaria which can be prevented by using a mosquito net that costs just $20 in the United States.  Pennington says, “You have a significant impact on a life here on this earth for the eternal Kingdom. So I would say ‘don’t shy away from being involved. Embrace it.’”

Almost 80% of those killed are children under age 5.

Humanitarian groups around the world have banded together to fight the scourge of malaria, and one Christian group joining them is Blessings International, an organization based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Blessings International provides quality, affordable medicine for mission teams demonstrating the love of Jesus Christ in the U.S. and around the world.

Barry Ewy with malaria patients. (Photo courtesy Blessings Int’l)

Barry Ewy, CEO of Blessings International, sees the April 25 observance of World Malaria Day as an opportunity to raise awareness about the problem of malaria.

Malaria is widespread, as well as deadly. Almost half the world’s population lives in areas at risk for the mosquito-borne illness. The struggling economies of the 97 countries afflicted by malaria absorb an estimated $1.2 trillion–up to 40% of their public health spending, according to worldmalariaday.org. The costs of treatment keep poor families trapped in a cycle of illness and poverty.

Yet, none of this is necessary. “One of the frustrating things for those of us who are working in this area is that it’s preventable,” Ewy says. “We’ve seen prevention in the United States that has worked very well. But unfortunately many developing nations don’t have the infrastructure that’s necessary to both deal with and prevent malaria.”

A major problem outside the U.S. is that many people simply cannot afford malaria medication. “For example, chloroquine tablets–for a full treatment for an adult–are only somewhere around a dollar and a half. Very reasonable,” Ewy says. “But if you are living in a developing nation, a dollar is a day’s wages. That can certainly be difficult for those people to be able to obtain.”

On top of that, some of the malaria medicines distributed overseas are either counterfeit or substandard.

“Putting counterfeit medicine in the hands of someone who is suffering from malaria is basically just putting sugar tablets in their hands, and it’s doing nothing,” Ewy says. “We want to be sure that people are getting the medicine, the quality medicine that they need to prevent and to treat the diseases that we know are out there.”

In support of this year’s theme for World Malaria Day — “End malaria for good” — Blessings International is partnering with another Tulsa-based group, Kairos 10, to put a big dent in the number of people suffering from the disease.

Kairos 10 sells jewelry handmade by African artisans and pours proceeds of their sales into the fight against malaria. Blessings International is partnering with Kairos 10 to donate a full dose of malaria medicine and a treated anti-mosquito bed net for each bracelet Kairos 10 sells during April and May.

The malaria medicine will be used by mission teams that show and share the love of Christ in Africa, Asia, Central America, and the Caribbean, where malaria threatens both livelihoods and lives.

In this series of items on the anti-malaria partnership between Blessings International and Kairos 10, we will be examining in depth the causes, effects, and solutions of the malaria scourge.

Please pray that God’s people will feel His heart for those suffering with malaria and help get the disease under control. Pray that acts of compassion like these will open hearts to the good news of God’s love in Jesus Christ.

For more information about the anti-malaria campaign, visit www.blessing.org. At the site, you also can learn more about Blessings International’s 35-year ministry and some of the almost 3,000 teams they helped in 99 countries during 2015.

For more information about the global malaria problem, click here.