Hunger is a constant in the lives of people in the western region of Kenya where WiRED provides health training programs. This year, food shortage is much worse than ever, as the most severe drought in 30 years has dried up crops
This December members of the WiRED International community contributed “lunch money” donations to the Sunshine-Mitzvah Fund in order to purchase groceries and Christmas treats for more than 200 families in Kisumu, Kenya, where our community health workers provide their medical and health services.
For years, WiRED has collected small amounts of money from Board members and friends for what we call the Sunshine-Mitzvah Fund (see sidebar). Sister Bernadette Nealon and her staff at several clinical centers in Kisumu, who use WiRED’s health education programs, have covered small necessities needed by the local population with these funds. These supplements include money for medications, food for hungry children and rides to a hospital for the sick who would otherwise have to walk.
Happy New Year and welcome to our new website! WiRED’s new look and content present a graphic and easy-to-navigate description of what we do, what we’ve done and who we are.
WiRED International’s staff, volunteers and board celebrate the end of our 22nd year of providing free community health education in low-resource regions of the world.
This holiday WiRED International wishes to express our gratitude to our tireless volunteers and partners in the U.S. and abroad. Your support helps us create, distribute and deliver WiRED’s health training programs to populations with minimal health care and no other sources of health education.
Many of WiRED’s board members, staff and volunteers live in California, and, as I write this essay, we are holed up in our homes, able to venture outside only for chores and obligations we cannot avoid. When I worked in Iraq and stayed in safe-houses, it was sometimes the same.
WiRED announced the delivery on May 30 in Montenegro of 90, Internet-ready computers to be distributed and installed at eight schools in six cities in Montenegro. Montenegro, along with Serbia, comprises the former Yugoslavia. The project was accepted and endorsed by the government of Montenegro and placed under the Ministry of Education.