FOC Donation Buys Books for Health Workers
Elizabeth Jenkins-Joffe reports that a $250 donation from Friends of Colombia has been spent at Hesperians Gratis Book Fund. Books were sent to Curt Wands, a Quaker with Concern America who trains local people as health care workers for their villages in the remote and mountainous northwest area Choc. They are from 32 different communities, speaking Wauunan, Ember, and the Choc version of Spanish. They are Indigenous, Afro-Colombian and Mestizo, women and men.
In addition to issues of poverty, the region is torn between the national government's army, paramilitary groups of varying allegiances, insurgents against the government, and armies of the drug lords. The Gratis Book Fund (GBF) provided Curts trainees with nine copies of Donde no hay doctor, three of Donde no hay dentista, and one of El nio campesino deshabilitado to distribute to his health promoters.
They also included pamphlets excerpted from their soon-to-be published books on environmental health: Sanitation and Cleanliness (three copies) and Water for Life (25 copies)all in Spanish versions. Without FOCS donation, GBF would not have been able to provide these sorely needed materials.