In 2016 TTF ran a Crowd Funding campaign through Caring Crowd to support 50 of the most malnourished patients at Tiny Tim & Friends. Thanks to the support of 79 donors who came together to support our cause, and to Johnson & Johnson who matched every donation, we were successful in reaching our goal. So in early 2017 we spent time undertaking home visits, to understand the needs of our patients, and identifying those most in need of nutritional support. Finding 25 children and adolescents who were eligible was sadly not difficult. Many of the children were so malnourished and underweight they were suffering with opportunistic infections and alongside nutritional support also required supervised palliative care to help them get well. Supporting families with nutritional food packages is easy. But ensuring the children we are supporting are gaining weight and getting healthy is much more complex, involving regular counselling, home assessments, medical interventions and sometimes palliative care.
Thanks to the support of 79 donors through CaringCrowd and from the hard work of our counsellors all of the children gained weight, including one child who gained a massive 9kgs. Stay posted for further stories of each of these children but in the meantime we hope you enjoy seeing the pictures of just a few of the children you have changed the lives of.
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AS SOON AS WE ASKED RACHEL'S MOTHER ABOUT FOOD SHE BROKE DOWN IN TEARSBy Jac Connell, Acting Country Director, Tiny Tim & Friends: A few weeks ago one of the social work team came to my office with a small child, Rachel (aged 2), who had been identified at the Clinic that day as HIV+ and at risk of TB. Weighing only 7.1kgs (15lbs), our counselor, Mwenda, was concerned about malnutrition and wanted to include Rachel on the list of patients who would benefit from our crowd funding campaign, should we be successful. She was incredibly tiny and I could tell from holding her that she had breathing problems and a persistent cough, a symptom we see often at the clinic and a primary indicator of TB. As with all of the patients we are considering supporting with nutrition the team usually sit with the family or undertake a home visit to assess what the household is like, how many people the individual lives with and what the income for the household is. As soon as we asked Elina, Rachel's mother, about food for the family she broke down in tears. She admitted that there was no food at home, as her husband was bedridden with TB and therefore had lost his job. They were totally reliant on her mother in law to provide food and often would survive on only one meal a day. RACHEL IS VULNERABLE. BEING UNDERWEIGHT PUTS HER AT RISK OF A NUMBER OF ILLNESSES WHICH COULD PROVE FATAL.Sadly, their story isn't particularly unique to us. They live in a two room house, sharing a pit latrine with their neighbors (17 people in total). Elina had never been to school as a child because her family couldn't afford it and therefore had never been able to get a job herself. Rachel's father is unable to work so they pay their rentals (approx $30 per month) through support from other family members.
Rachel has an older sister, who is 7 and in good health, but who has had to stop going to school after they could no longer pay the school fees. Rachel has been diagnosed with TB, but without food, both her and her father will struggle to take their medicine, recover and risk passing the disease to her mother. Having only recently started on HIV treatment, Rachel is in a vulnerable situation. Being underweight puts her at risk of picking up any number of illnesses which could prove to be fatal. We need all of our donors and supporters around the world to come together to support children like Rachel through our crowd funding campaign - by donating you will change a child's life: PANJI IS DESPARATE TO FINISH SCHOOL BUT HAS NOT BEEN ABLE TO ATTEND FOR OVER 6 MONTHS DUE TO POOR HEALTH Sadly, sometimes patients come to TTF and from their appearance you immediately you know there is a major health problem. This was the case for 19 year old Panji when he was brought to the TTF Clinic earlier this year. Panji is 1.73m (5ft 8) and weighs only 42Kgs (92lbs). He is significantly malnourished and currently undergoing tests to see if he is suffering from Tuberculosis. His malnutrition, alongside HIV and suspected TB puts his health at significant risk, and without boosting his immune system just a small infection could prove fatal. Panji's parents died when he was just a child and he now lives in a one room house with 6 other people (his sister (pictured below), brother in law, and four nieces and nephews), sharing a pit latrine with 20 other people. Whilst food in the home is provided by Panji's brother in law, there isn't enough to support Panji in his current state and he is in desperate need of nutritional support. He needs your help to ensure he can go on to finish his education and lead a healthy, successful life. "I WANT TO FINISH SCHOOL SO I CAN BECOME A DOCTOR AND HELP OTHERS"Panji, was identified in the community by one of our teen mentors. He had previously been tested for HIV but wasn't yet ready to accept his status. Our staff have been working closely with him to provide him with medical advice and emotional counselling to prepare him to start on medication. But because of his late access to treatment he is incredibly sick and because of his poor health, he has been unable to attend school for the past 6 months. He desperately wants to complete his education so he can make something of his life and help others.
With the right medical, social and nutritional support Panji can go onto lead a healthy life, but we need your donations to support him and 49 other children and adolescents like him to reach our crowdfunding goal. So please consider pledging today and changing Panjis life around for the better! Last week we successfully graduated 8 children out of our nutrition programme after just 3 months. All 8 of these children had gained such a great amount of weight and grown in height that they are now well within the healthy weight range on the BMI index.
Through our nutrition programme, not only have we been able to support these vulnerable children to gain weight and become healthy, but we have also provided their families and caregivers with nutritional support and education needed to ensure that can help their children to have a well balanced diet. The weekly food packages have also allowed families to make small savings in their weekly outgoings to support several of them in investing into their small businesses or paying for school fees. Thanks to the support of 34 donors who funded our CARINGCROWD CrowdFunding programe at the end of last year. Please stay posted for individual stories on each of these children. For more information about our nutrition programme and how you can get involved in us helping even more malnourished, vulnerable children to get healthy and get the education they need check out our programme page: Nutrition programme. Sometimes you try your hardest to make a change in a child's life and are unsuccessful - but when you are successful that is definitely worth celebrating and sharing with the world! Many of you may remember Everson, a 13 year old child who was brought to us last year suffering with extreme malnutrition, neglect, and a variety of other health issues. His story stuck with the staff at Tiny Tim & Friends due to the fact that when he arrived at our Clinic many of our staff prepared themselves for the worst. We worked hard with our partners at Our Ladies Hospice, to provide him emergency palliative care, found him a stable safe home at MacDonalds Farm, and have continued to treat him over the past 18 months to make sure he can lead a healthy, productive life. Last week our social work team went to visit him at the Farm, to see how he was doing, and whilst he was showing them his vegetable garden he has been cultivating he said he would like to go back to Our Ladies Hospice, to thank the staff who helped him to recover over a year ago. This week we went with Everson back to Our Ladies Hospice for an incredibly emotional and rewarding visit. None of this would have been possible if it wasn't for the hard work and dedication of the staff at Our Ladies Hospice; the nurturing environment and safe home he has at MacDonalds Farm; and all of the TTF donors and supporters who enabled us to provide 4 months of intensive palliative care and medical treatment at the TTF Clinic. So we want to share with you in this celebration and as a picture can say a thousand words - here are just some from our day: Thank you to everyone who made this transformation possible - we are eternally grateful for your support and donations - without working in partnership none of this would have been possible!
THANK YOU! "Without improving nutrition, the world will fail to achieve many of the Sustainable Development Goals. There is an urgent moral and practical imperative for the world to make ambitious, measurable, and timebound commitments to equitably improve nutrition. In monitoring these commitments, the Global Nutrition Report will help us hold ourselves accountable. Lives depend on it."
Anthony Lake, Executive Director, UNICEF Yesterday saw the launch of the Global Nutrition Report 2015, stating that good nutrition provides a foundation for human development and the scaffolding needed for people to fulfill their full potential. Good nutrition is an essential driver to human development. Without good nutrition human beings cannot fulfill their full potential. Many of you will remember, Evison, the young boy who came to TTF last year completely malnourished with a range of ilnesses - you will also remember the fantastic transformation in his health after just 5 months with us. To ensure that we can support even more children like Evison we have teamed up with CARINGCROWD℠, a new crowdfunding platform seeking to address global health inequalities and powered by Johnson & Johnson.
www.caringcrowd.org/nourish-25-hiv-children-and-families We are aiming to raise $6,500 in just 30 days to support 25 of the most vulnerable, malnourished children and families at the TTF clinic. In order to do so need as many of our supporters as possible to pledge money to our cause and/ or share with your networks. If we do not reach our target within the allocated time we dont get a penny - therefore we are looking for project advocates who can help achieve our goal. So how can you support us? Tiny Tim & Friends always welcomes ideas from new and existing supporters who come up with innovative ways to support our work . Earlier on this year Mark and James got married in London and after hearing about the work of TTF through a friend decided instead of asking for gifts from their guests they would ask for donations to support our work.
"We heard about Tiny Tim and Friends through a good friend and instantly recognised what a great organisation they are. We wanted to support them and as they are a small organisation, any donation made would go directly to those who need it and really will make a difference." Through the generosity and support of Mark, James and their guests $1,125 was raised for Tiny Tim & Friends programmes. The team at TTF send a huge thank you to Mark and James for allowing us to be a part of their day and celebrations and to all of their guests for the generous donations given. For inspiration on how you can support Tiny Tim and Friends visit our fundraising page or contact our fundraising team and have a positive impact on the lives of HIV+ children in Zambia. |
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