26 December 2010
Mutambara Mission Hospital
29/12/10 13:53 Filed in: VIM
The High Risk Mother’s Shelter at Mutambara Mission Hospital, Zimbabwe needs your help! The Mother’s Shelter was originally a government-run hospital based shelter for single, pregnant women; however, the government no longer funds the shelter. Two summers ago Florence Mefor, registered nurse midwife and wife of Missionary Doctor Emmanual Mefor, decided to undertake the responsibility of running the shelter.
The shelter now serves in two capacities. First, it maintains its original goal to provide shelter to women who must stay close to the hospital in order to deliver their baby safely. But the shelter has taken on an additional role - it also extends its services to women who have been abandoned or abused by their husbands. At the shelter these high risk mothers are fed and given a place to sleep up to one month before they give birth. They are also allowed to stay one month after their child has been born to address any complications.
In June of 2010, a donation of $150 would allow Florence to feed 60 women and infants for 2 weeks. “I am now struggling to raise the money to buy food for the women on a missionary’s salary,” says Florence. “Not only that, it is hard to see babies sent away without even as much as a blanket.”
Florence’s goal of sustaining the shelter led her to developing a “canteen” (restaurant) for the Mutambara area. All of the profits will be used to sustain the High Risk Mother’s Shelter and provide blankets for infants on a long term basis! While the canteen is more than half finished, it will require approximately $5,000 to make it operational.
If you would like to support this ministry, a number of options are available:
- Make a blanket or provide money for the purchase of a baby blanket (blankets are available for purchase in Zimbabwe). To ensure that a blanket will make it safely to the Mutambara High Risk Mother’s Shelter, please email r_ports@hotmail.com or cem23@students.calvin.edu to make arrangements.
- Make a tax deductible donation through the United Methodist Church. Please make checks payable to: UMCOR Advance #982168: Mutambara Waiting Mother’s Shelter. In the memo, please write canteen to support the sustainable project, or write food to provide direct support to the waiting mothers, or write blanket to buy baby blankets. Any support is greatly appreciated.