Setting People FREE… from Trachoma!

Back in January we came to you on behalf of Martha Lochockwe (a nurse from Samburu, Kenya) to help save her people from a painful and blinding eye infection called trachoma.

Through gifts like yours, we were able to:

• raise $166,537 for the people of Samburu – enough to give 1,790 people sight-saving surgery,
  
• train over 1,000 community workers (to teach trachoma prevention) and
  
• protect the sight of 55,512 children with trachoma-killing antibiotics!

Good News for Nkasis and Naitemua

In Martha’s letter she mentioned a grandmother named Nkasis who was suffering from advanced trachoma.

The painful scratching of her eyelashes against her cornea kept her from opening her eyes. Her granddaughter, Naitemua, gave up going to school to lead her grandmother around.

Thanks to someone from Canada, Nkasis was given eyelid rotation surgery – to stop her lashes’ painful scratching. A few weeks later, we received this good news email from the Samburu Dispensary!

Subject: Good News!
To: cbm@cbmcanada.org
From: Sister Gloria Sauck, Samburu Dispensary

Nkasis is doing well! Her visual acuity has improved and now is 6/36 in her left eye and 6/12 in her right eye. Left eye still a little sore after surgery, but minimally so, with some corneal haziness. Her right eye looks real nice. She no longer needs her granddaughter Naitemua to help her as before. In fact, she can walk independently to the nearby town of Ngurunit, which is an hour walk, to do shopping or whatever she wants. So hers is truly a success story in blindness prevention.

God Bless! - Gloria Sauck
(eye nurse, Samburu, Kenya)

Shing Jesus' light through Easter miracles of sight!

This past Easter, we offered you the opportunity to share Jesus’ love in a very tangible way... to fill a whole lifetime with light through a gift of cataract surgery!

Canadians like you poured out blessing and gave $345,651 – enough to make over 10,400 miracles of sight possible for people trapped in the darkness of blindness.

Just one of 10,400 Easter miracles of sight!

Hassamou was abandoned by her husband when she was pregnant with her daughter, Nana. And that was just the beginning of her fears…

When Nana was 15 months old, Hassamou realised Nana was blind with cataracts in both her tiny eyes. She couldn’t even see her mom.

The fact is, in poor countries, most children who are blind die in childhood. It’s hard enough being desperately poor, let alone trying to survive if you’re blind.

Little Nana needed a miracle. And that’s exactly what you gave her.

A miracle cataract operation through cbm is more than restored sight. Hassamou says, “the community will respect Nana now. They will stop calling her ’The Blind Nana’.” “I am very happy that Nana can see. Now she can walk, she can go to school.”

Remember bright, beautiful Merci!

She was born with a cleft palate.

This past March, we wrote to you on behalf of some very sad children… kids who couldn’t eat properly, who couldn’t talk properly, who faced starvation and rejection – all because they were born with a cleft palate or a cleft lip.

You responded to our challenge by giving a generous $116,791 – enough to rebuild 116 cleft palates and 233 cleft lips – giving kids SMILES for life!

Kids just like Collin. Collin’s mother is thrilled with the difference cleft lip surgery has made in his life. “I have struggled to feed him and he used to cry all through the night. The neighbours found him frightening and I never took him out of the house. I am so grateful that cbm has helped my child! Thank you!”

The difference your gifts are making:

Your Mother's Day gifts:

Saving children from hydrocephalus and healing mothers’ broken hearts

In May, we asked you to honour a mom in your life by giving a remarkable gift… a gift that would save the life of a child suffering from hydrocephalus. Gifts like yours have made a life-saving, heart-mending difference for children like Rahma and her mom Tatu.

Saving Rahma’s life, healing Tatu’s heart

Tatu noticed something was wrong with her daughter, Rahma, when she was just 3 months old. Rahma’s head was unusually
large...

“I was scared.” Tatu recalls, “Some people told me that my daughter had water in the head. I asked ‘how could this have
happened?’”

Rahma had hydrocephalus, andeveryday that passed without treatmentmoved Rahma closer to permanentdisability and death.

“I asked God to show the right way to get treatment and God said ‘Come to CCBRT’ (cbm’s partner in Tanzania),” Tatu says.

At 5 months old, through the generosity of someone like you, Rahma was given a shunt to re-route the fluid that was putting dangerous pressure on her brain.

Rahma’s life is saved and Tatu is overflowing with gratitude… all because of a gift from someone like you.

"I thank you for what you have given me and my daughter."
- Tatu, Rahma's mother

So far, through supporters like you, we’ve been able to provide $72,294 worth of treatment and care to kids with hydrocephalus, enough to give life and hope to 185 children and their mothers!

Through cbm’s Emergency Fund, Canadians are caring for the needs of survivors with disabilities living in the battered regions of Myanmar and China.

Situation report: Myanmar
Despite initial struggles to gain visas needed to enter Myanmar, cbm’s emergency team has been working hard to raise awareness and action to address the special needs of survivors with disabilities. These people are too often forgotten in crisis situations and in relief programs.

Valerie Scherrer, cbm’s emergency coordinator, and her team have been meeting regularly with other international relief and development agencies to educate them on how best to serve disabled survivors.

Please, keep praying for Valerie, her team, and the entire relief effort – as they fight to bring urgently needed relief to victims of Cyclone Nargis.

Situation report: Sichuan Province, China

From the moments after the earthquake on May 12, cbm’s partner, China Disabled Peoples Federation, has been working alongside the government in the rescue effort. They’re also involved in providing:

• Medical care for earthquake survivors
  
• Assistive devices for people disabled as a result of the quake
  
• Training for rehabilitation workers – providing community-based rehabilitation that will help people with disabilities rebuild their lives.

cbm's partner gave earthquake survivor - 12-year-old Li -
urgent surgery and will give her the support she needs to
adjust to life with one leg. – The South Capital Weekly

Rebuilding lives in Kenya

Since the violence that displaced 500,000 people across Kenya earlier this year, cbm has been working with the Kenya Red Cross and our local Partners to:

• Provide emergency care – making sure people with disabilities receive emergency food aid.
  
• Give mobility aids to people disabled by violence – for example, cbm provided 100 wheelchairs for people in Eldoret whose legs had to be amputated as a result of the violence.
  
• Restore and rebuild goods lost in the riots – through cbm, your gifts are helping people with disabilities rebuild shops, restore lost merchandise, and regain lost income as a result of looting and burning.

Together we are doing more… to help sick kids in Uganda and Toronto!

Imagine doctors in Kumi, Uganda, learning and growing together with doctors from the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Ontario… Thanks to a satellite internet link, and a grant from the Bridgeway Foundation, cbm is making this a reality!

“It was exciting to explore the possibility of outfitting Kumi Hospital with a stable internet connection!

Especially knowing that, as a result, doctors in Kumi would be able to share knowledge with doctors in Toronto – as well as have access to the University of Toronto’s full medical resource library.

This will be an invaluable tool for improving the quality of care in both communities and will attract more doctors into an otherwise isolated, rural hospital like Kumi.”

- Leighton Wong, cbm IT Manager working on the “Sick Kids” – “Kumi” project.

By linking orthopaedic surgeons on two sides of the globe, we believe we can set more kids free… for life!

More Miracles for Life!

On May 14, 2008, 439 friends of cbm gathered in Markham, Ontario, to meet, pray, and experience life-changing moments…

In one hour, our guests heard, saw, and journeyed through the poorest countries of the world – seeing the difference cbm is making in the lives of people with disabilities.

These generous friends – both new and familiar – committed over $300,000 towards rescuing the world’s forgotten people.

And, praise the Lord, that’s exactly what their gifts will do!

Come by for a Life-Changing Tour!

If you live in the greater Toronto area and want to get excited about cbm – there’s nothing like stopping by and seeing what we do with your own eyes! So far in 2008, 328 people have had an in depth tour of our work… opening their eyes to the needs of people with disabilities trapped in poverty.

If you’d like to come on a Life Changing Moments tour, call Robin at 1 800 567 2264, ext. 245! She’d love to meet you!