Here's a link to a couple minutes of footage of the visit mentioned in the press release in the previous post. You can see some views of inside the hospital.

http://www.unmultimedia.org/tv/unifeed/d/13419.html

NBA legend Dikembe Mutombo, UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman and BD commemorate opening of new center to improve HIV/AIDS treatment in the DRC

http://www.unicef.org/media/media_50959.html

NBA legend Dikembe Mutombo, UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman and BD
commemorate opening of new center to improve HIV/AIDS treatment in the DRC

*KINSHASA, DRC, 26 August 2009** –* The Biamba Marie Mutombo Hospital and
Research Center (BMMH), in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo and BD
(Becton, Dickinson and Company) today launched two Centers of Excellence -
an Immune System Monitoring Laboratory and an Occupational Safety Centre for
Health Workers - at the state of the art medical facility founded by NBA
legend Dikembe Mutombo. The safety center will train more than 300
clinicians, and the new laboratory will improve monitoring and treatment of
patients living with HIV/AIDS.

Mr. Mutombo was joined at the opening ceremonies by UNICEF Executive
Director Ann M. Veneman, BD Executive Vice President Gary Cohen, and the DRC
Minister of Public Health, Mwami Mopipi Mukulumany. The Center is an
expansion of the BMMH, an acute care hospital which opened in 2007 and
provides care to thousands of patients each year in a region of the world
where over five million people have died from violence, hunger and disease
since 1998.

“The doctors and nurses at the Biamba Marie Mutombo Hospital are saving
lives every day and helping improve health care in the DRC which has been
ravaged by more than a decade of war and disease,” said Mr. Mutombo. “These
Centers of Excellence are an important milestone in improving the quality of
life for those who live with HIV/AIDS and in training new health care
workers to help prevent the spread of disease.”

The new Centers will provide laboratory equipment, reagents and training to
improve immune system monitoring, an essential component of treating people
living with HIV/AIDS. To help ensure the safety of healthcare workers at the
facility, DMF will develop a Department of Occupational Health and a
Regional Training Center at the BMMH. BD, in collaboration with the
University of Virginia, will help implement the Exposure Prevention
Information Network (EPINet™) surveillance system to monitor occupational
injuries at BMMH. BD will also provide a range of safety-engineered
injection and safety-engineered blood collection devices as well as
laboratory and occupational safety training for at least 330 healthcare
workers.

“The problems of pandemic disease prevalence and occupational risks to
health workers exist throughout sub-Saharan Africa, but pose particular
challenges in countries emerging from conflict,” said Mr. Cohen. “We are
proud to partner with Dikembe Mutombo, and to support his efforts to provide
essential medical care to the people of Kinshasa and DRC, his home country.”

( Read more... )

L’Avenir (pro-government), article, front page , “DRC Infiltrated, Joseph Kabila must Clean Up the Intelligence Agency.“

On May 15, Radio France Internationale (RFI) journalist Ghislaine Dupont disclosed an internal document of the DRC National Intelligence Agency (ANR) in an apparent attempt to discredit the chief of Domestic Security. The document provides information on corrupt ANR agents and release of some prisoners held by ANR.  Infighting within the ANR is used to feed an ongoing conspiracy against the DRC institutions. Many people have infiltrated the ANR, which calls into question the ANR’s loyalty toward the GDRC. Those who use international media to damage the reputation of a rival not only weaken an individual, they also undermine the whole country as well as the institutions that depend on the ANR’s performance. The lingering question remains: who is manipulating whom-- RFI or the National Intelligence Agency?

Le Potentiel, (independent), editorial, front page, “Military and Intelligence Service Reform.“

Reforming the armed forces and the intelligence service is a priority, considering the Government’s need to restore peace and stability to the DRC’s troubled regions. During his visit to Kinshasa, AFRICOM Commander General Ward insisted on the need for reforming the Congolese army and for forming professional and efficient armed forces.  He indicated that AFRICOM is ready to help the DRC reach these objectives. In the same spirit, the DRC foreign minister recently stressed that there is no viable State without strong armed forces and an effective intelligence service. The success of any military operation is contingent on covert and diligent intelligence gathering as well as on the effective processing and transmission of such intelligence. Future reforms should provide strict recruitment criteria to avert manipulation and leaks that may benefit enemies. Reforming the military and intelligence sectors is a major component in any national security strategy. 

Compiled by John Kalonji, PD Section.

These entries are in French (sorry) but provide interesting observations on religion in present-day DR Congo. Click for photos.

I don't often take photos of people especially if I don't know them, because I don't have the journalist approach and typically feel shy about it.  I don't like to invade people's space.  But here are two that I took of people that I do know, and I hope they don't mind my sharing.  They each capture a very particular and fleeting moment in their expressions, and I like the contrast.

Look at this!  If only I lived next door, I'd have thousands of TV channels...

Not stitched, but not edited, either - I think I actually caught the color of the sky this time.


drc kinshasacongo

ps. I have the phone number if you want to rent it.

drc kinshasacongo

Apologies for the blurry quality of the photo, but I wanted to get the full-on fire glow, so I did not use flash. I could have used a tripod...

We passed this building the other day - in the car, thus the fuzziness - and I was trying to figure out what it's all about.  Is it saying that if there's something wrong with you, all you have to do is spit and they'll analyze it while you wait and tell you what they think is wrong?  My colleague pretty much affirmed this, and then asked, "Do they do that in the US?"  As far as I know, definitely not, but I could be wrong.  

Anyone know more than I do about instant saliva testing?



General exam based on saliva. Results in under 30 minutes, Sure, clear-cut, and exact.

The last two nights have been the type of political conversation mixed with bizarre international experiences that I miss when I just stay home all the time.  We made the rounds of the upcoming US elections, the deseating of Mbeki, the non-deal signed by Mugabe and Tsvangirai, the secessionists in Belgium, and Sarkozy's new anti-socialist France.

Then there was talk about CAR, Sudan and Tchad.  One of our friends is heading there soon, and told us that you have to watch out for the Zagawa.  They are the tribe of the President of Tchad, and they are reputedly untouchable.  He said that one of the guys working for his organization came back from leave only to find an extra electric cable attached to his house, which he removed.  The following day, his neighbor came by to inform him that he'd be reinstalling the cable, which channeled the electricity to the neighbor's house, and that he would now be paying for his neighbor's electricity.  Our friend said, there's nothing to be done - you just smile and say thank you.  

Then he mentioned homes that had been cleared out when people were away on leave, and the office lootings (in N'Djamena, I think)  that had happened. After one looting fairly recently, a local informatics person called to say that she was reformatting a laptop and noticed emails from his organization.  She saved the data and sent it to him, saying that she could recover that but not the laptop itself.  It was obvious that she had lots of experience with this type of transaction.

Our friend was making fun of a colleague of his, who is always in a hurry and overzealous when perhaps he shouldn't be.  The guy is heading to Tchad soon, so he was advised to just proceed slowly, especially when driving.  He said that the Zagawa will just stop in the middle of the road for 10 minutes to take a phone call, and you'll see him laughing and talking, but you can't pass him.

So finally the guy who was having his electricity siphoned off came back from Tchad to Kinshasa, saying he was incredibly relieved to be there, happy even...

I don't know if any of you remember this.  I found out tonight that it's not always that easy. 

My boss was with me and I locked the key in a different car that, fortunately, I suppose, is much more difficult to break into.  This means we had to leave a group working on breaking into the car until they get tired of it, then guarding it till morning, because there was no spare key to be found in a logical place.

Very embarrassing.  Even so, I took a photo for your viewing enjoyment.

I commented somewhere the other day that I didn't want to deal with coming home late and waking up the presidential guards in the middle of the night, which is why I stayed over at a friend's house.

For the most part, I don't have any problems.  The apartment where I am staying is close to one of the presidential residences, which means we have electricity and water when many do not.  I have to stop at the military barrier and tell the guards where I live, but often they recognize the car and allow me to pass without talking to them.

The other night, though, I was reprimanded by a somewhat more surly guard, for not turning on the interior light of the car, so he could see who I was.  I've been told that this is UN protocol, but nobody has asked this of me before.

I mentioned this to some friends, and they said that there had been somewhat of a crackdown on the UN, which does not include me but might as well, since I live near them.  There is a lot of distrust of MONUC these days because the government thinks that MONUC is supporting Laurent Nkunda's rebels in the east and keeping the axe (road) free to the north, where they have been gaining territory.

The political and military situation here is always difficult to understand, and this time even more so.  I am not exactly certain what Nkunda's intent is, other than to carve out a Tutsi section of DR Congo as refuge for his "people" (yes this is a simplistic view).  There has been a tenuous ceasefire (read: not respected) for months now, but the FARDC government troops and Nkunda's troops continue to fight sporadically.  At any rate, people are worried here in the west as well, although just this morning I saw an article that indicated that Nkunda has ceded some of the territory he had previously taken so that aid workers can reach those areas.

I posted about the penis theft panic that hit Kinshasa when I was last there in April, and Reuters had picked up the story too. 

At least one person commented that it was a common concern in west Africa in addition to DR Congo, and apparently Harpers has now picked up the scent in A Mind Dismembered: In Search of the Magical Penis Thieves.

These are a few of my colleagues in Kinshasa, working at a hospital with our pediatric HIV program (volunteers, counselors, and doctor).



The program used to receive support from the World Food Program, which provided nutrition kits to all people living with HIV/AIDS.  I am not sure why WFP stopped providing this support, other than the fact that it is probably very expensive, but they did.  Many folks do not have adequate nutrition in the first place, and with HIV and medications if they are on antiretrovirals, their situation can be even worse.

At the moment, our program does not support all people with HIV, or even all children with HIV.  We are providing a nutritional package for malnourished and severely malnourished children only.  The storage of materials is on the left, and the package is on the right.  This represents one month's allocation of oil, sugar, maize, soy flour, and powdered milk.

      

The main drawback, in addition to not reaching all children or all people living with HIV, is that even with proper counseling and emphasis to parents on the health of the infant, it's pretty clear that a family is not going to deny these supplies to other children or family members.  Without additional supplies/funding, however, it's a bit of a conundrum.