Less than two weeks after the SANRU health team responded to a tornado, which displaced over 20,000 persons in the Congolese river city of Yumbi, a chain of barges left the capital city of Kinshasa today, with over 60 tons of relief material in a second-stage relief mission initiated by SANRU/IMA/USAID.

The SANRU III project, in cooperation with the Ministry of Health has spent night and day over the past week putting together this enormous shipment (overfilling three barges) with project resources from SANRU and IMA as well as material solicited from international organizations such as UNICEF, FAO, USAID and OFDA.The purpose of this mission is multifaceted: to provide supplemental food and shelter to the over 7000 displaced families, installation of clean water sources and sanitation systems to avoid the threat of a cholera epidemic, provide mosquito netting to thousands of families vulnerable to malaria during this rainy season, furnish basic living kits to families and school kits(UNICEF) to children to help replace essential items lost in the storm.Medical relief material from OFDA and IMA was brought in during the first phase of this effort to replace that lost when three of the four health facilities in this city of 40,000 persons were destroyed.

IMA has obtained an additional $110,000 worth of pharmaceutical products (disaster medical kits) from Bristol Meyers and Squibb, which are being air-lifted to the Democratic Republic of Congo and will be transported to Yumbi in the near future.

Bill

William C. Clemmer, M.D.
IMA Representative to SANRU III