17 August 2012

Team to visit Malawi in September

The next team (which includes an ophthalmologist, an orthoptist and an optometrist) is preparing to visit Malawi in September 2012. Destinations will include the school for the blind in Ekwendeni, and the mission hospitals at Ekwendeni, Livingstonia and Embangweni. The team will be doing some clinics but, importantly, hoping to identify potential local staff to train and develop. It will also be a time of listening to hospital and community health managers and staff, catching up with their news, and understanding current challenges. The political upheavals of the last year, interruptions in foreign aid, the devaluation of the currency -- together with rocketing fuel pries -- are placing great strains on people and services.