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Poverty Alleviation Projects
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2006 Projects
March 13, 2006
Dear Friends:
Welcome to your March 2006 report for The $10 Club.
Approximately 1,000 children (including 300 orphans) currently reside in
three different camps for internally displaced people along the border
between Thailand and the Shan State in Burma. Some of the children in these
camps are former child soldiers who fought to avenge their parents and have
since been disarmed and enrolled in school. Others are victims of violence
who saw their parents murdered and villages burned, and suffer from
posttraumatic stress disorders. Still others are victims of sexual violence.
Burma's repressive military regime has engaged in brutal ethnic cleansing
as part of a war against the ethnic states in Burma including the Shan. It
is illegal in Burma to teach the Shan language, history, or culture, and
no schooling is allowed in parts of the rural countryside. Eighty percent
of Shans receive no education at all. Teachers risk prison, torture and
death.
Shan Orphan Support (SOS)
was created at the request of southern Shan leaders to promote awareness of
the Shan situation and help get support for Shan children. SOS has worked
hard to initiate and expand School-Based Health Centers serving displaced
people and refugees along the Thailand/Shan State, Burma border. In
addition to schooling, these centers deliver preventive and curative
medical, dental, and mental healthcare services to underserved children.
This month 291 of us gave $2,910 to SOS to support the health centers by
providing teacher/nurse training, medical and dental supplies, and personal
hygiene items including soap and shampoo. We'll also provide all the
orphans with sandals for their feet. The teacher/nurse will assume duties
regarding simple health and dental care for the kids in coordination with
the village nurse. Thank you.
The children are suffering from many common childhood illnesses and hygiene
issues that are exacerbated by lack of resources - sore throats, earaches,
fevers, coughs, septic wounds and scrapes, rashes, cuts, and sprains. We'll
help provide the children with dozens of vital medicines and supplies
including penicillin, tetracycline, amoxicillin, antifungal and
antibacterial creams, vitamins, calamine lotion, rubbing alcohol, bandages,
etc.
Many diseases (malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS) require long-term
treatments and are sensitive to reliable application of medicine - lack of
oversight is a serious problem. We'll help ensure that there is proper
supervision of medical treatments so they can be applied consistently.
Todd Jones of SOS tells me "Your sponsorship will launch the program and
build the foundation for good things to come. I'm sure there are many good
causes that deserve your help, but what you do with us will break ground
where few have gone." Thanks to you, The $10 Club is going to fund a
critical preliminary component of SOS's long-term strategy and we will be a
catalyst for the sustainable development of this vital project.
Saving the world, ten dollars at a time,
Adam
PS. If you're interested in the Shan's situation, check out this article
from TIME:
http://www.time.com/time/asia/magazine/printout/0,13675,501050704-1077199,00.html
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