URGENT COVID-19 NEWS FROM DARFUR SOAP APPEAL

Updates:

• On Sunday May 10th, 53 new cases of COVID-19 were announced bringing the known total to 1,164. The death toll is currently at 64.  More details here.
• “Sudan is in a precarious position as the transitional government deals with soaring inflation, high unemployment and a food shortage, but battling infectious Covid-19 could push it over its tipping point, according to Michele Bachelet, UN high commissioner for human rights.” Full article here. May 1st.
• We have had news from our Programme Manager that El Fasher is in lock down as the first two cases of COVID-19 have been identified.

Prevention and social distancing are the only known ways
to stop COVID-19 from spreading.

There is no health care in villages in Darfur, Sudan, but I believe we can help.  Please will you enable us to provide five bars of soap to each family?  We need it right now, if there is to be a chance of making a difference. We have already delivered soap for the first 19 Kids for Kids’ villages – there are another 81 – and then all the other villages in Darfur.

We must help to stop the spread as quickly as possible.  We are told social distancing and washing properly with soap and water works.  Soap breaks down the structure of the virus.  We must provide soap, now.  The Government of Sudan is targeting towns and markets, but their message will not reach remote villages.  We can. I also intend to give each family an illustrated sheet showing them how to wash their hands properly.  With so little water this is imperative.  We will of course continue to do all we can to provide more handpumps.  Water has always been our first concern.

£20 will provide 5 bars of soap, illustrated instruction leaflets, and transportation to the village – for 10 families. We have already delivered soap to 19 villages.  Just £380 per village; an average of 225 families in each. There are 100 Kids for Kids villages, but over 900 in Darfur.  Every family needs our help and every single bar of soap will make a difference.  I would appreciate any help you can give by supporting our Covid-19 Appeal for Soap.

Please watch this video.  Really clear advice from Dr. Clifford Mann OBE, the NHS lead for emergencies, being interviewed by Dr Omar Bagadi, about the implications for Sudan, and the rest of us.  Please look after yourself and your family.  We are not going to be clear of the danger for many months.  Please think too about what could happen if it takes off in Africa. In Darfur where water is scarce, where people are struggling to eat, the danger is very real.  We must provide soap – urgently.  And all our other help – if you would like to learn more about our water projects, please click here.

“People ask me how families can isolate in Darfur.  I’m afraid the simple answer is, they cannot.  They eat together, sharing a dish and eating with their right hands.  That is why washing is imperative – and washing properly, not sparingly as is normal because of the absence of clean running water close at hand in any village.   We are doing our best to drill more handpumps but there is a lack of fuel across the whole of Sudan which means the drilling rig cannot move at the moment.  They cannot store food for more than a short time because of the heat and the lack of electricity (fridges etc) so shopping in markets – if they have the money – means again, it is impossible to isolate.   Stories that the virus will die in heat are no good, as I understand it will survive in temperatures of over 50 degrees.”  – Patricia Parker MBE, Founder. 

As you know I have already been asking help to provide goat’s milk for children and eggs for the elderly, to help them build up resistance, as anyone who is malnourished will have even less of a chance against the virus.  But it is equally important to stop the virus now, before it is too late.  Soap will save lives.

To hear directly from Patricia Parker MBE, our Founder and CEO, as interviewed on Saturday 18th April on BBC Radio Sussex about this Appeal, listen here:

Please donate if you can, at this link here.  Thank you so much. To donate from outside the UK, please donate to our Project Appeal via GlobalGiving. To learn more about Kids for Kids, please watch this recent interview with Patricia Parker MBE.

And if you prefer to support by sending a cheque, please mark it ‘Soap Appeal’ and send to the following address:

Patricia Parker
Kids for Kids
P.O. Box 456,
Dorking, Surrey
RH4 2WS

For Questions and Press Enquiries: contact@kidsforkids.org.uk / 07957 206440

More news about coronavirus cases in Sudan is available here and details of the lockdown measures being taken are available here. (April 29th and April 26th).