THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 24, 1994 TAG: 9407240046
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOE JACKSON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines
A seven-member medical team from Operation Blessing left by charter plane Saturday to aid relief efforts for the millions of starving, cholera-stricken Rwandan refugees who have fled to neighboring Zaire.
The $300,000 relief effort is headed by Dr. Paul Williams, director of the medical division of the Virginia Beach-based Operation Blessing - a humanitarian organization founded in 1978 by religious broadcaster Pat Robertson. The team includes doctors, nurses and paramedics from across the nation.
``There's a strong burden in my heart for the tragic suffering of these people,'' Robertson said Saturday. ``They're dying like flies over there.'' Robertson said he saw the first wave of refugees three weeks ago while visiting Operation Blessing's farm project near Goma in Zaire.
The medical team will land in Goma on Monday morning and will spend the next six days assisting the European medical relief agency Doctors Without Borders.
Also on Saturday, a second Operation Blessing flight carrying 66,000 pounds of medicine and supplies left Amsterdam, Holland, a spokesman said.
The medication shipped on the two planes includes water-purification tablets and drugs to treat malaria, dehydration, diarrhea and intestinal parasites.
Among the most urgently needed supplies are oral rehydration therapy packages, used to replenish body salts lost during severe bouts of cholera and diarrhea, team members said Saturday. The foil-wrapped packages contain a water-soluble powder, resembling
Gatorade, made up of salts, sugar and electrolytes. The packages can save critically ill people within three hours, officials have said.
No one really knows how many people have died in the cholera epidemic, which broke out Wednesday.
By Friday morning, U.N. officials reported 1,300 cholera cases among the Goma refugees. There were about 800 deaths, 130 attributed to cholera and the rest to dehydration and related ills. Medical officials have predicted up to 50,000 cholera cases in the camps, and have warned that as many as half that number could die of the disease.
Members of the Operation Blessing team admitted Saturday that they, too, were potentially at risk. Sanitary conditions are rapidly becoming nonexistent as the camps have swelled in a few days from a few thousand inhabitants to hundreds of thousands.
The stench of decomposing bodies, human excrement and smoke from cooking fires fills the air.
There is no water or sanitation, and the camps are turning into graveyards as cholera sweeps through.
Team members said their safety lies in prevention. They plan to drink bottled water or use the water-purification tablets, and will eat prepackaged food, they said.
``We've had our shots,'' said Dr. Dora Akuetteh, of Tulsa, Okla. ``We just have to be careful.''
Even with this preparation, team members are not certain what they will face.
``The task is mind-boggling,'' Williams said.
The medical team is composed of four doctors, two paramedics and a nurse.
They are: Williams; Akuetteh; Dr. Mitch Duininck of Tulsa; Dr. Kent Roberson of Tulsa; Jessie Potts, a paramedic from Conyers, Ga.; Andre Valentine, a paramedic from Marietta, Ga.; and Sherri Zywiec, a registered nurse from Kansas City, Mo. MEMO: The Associated Press contributed to this story.
ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
IAN MARTIN/Staff
Pat Robertson, right, greets Dr. Paul Williams, director of
Operation Blessing's medical division, at Norfolk International
Airport.
by CNB