The Campaign

Ushered in by a parade of school marching bands, traditional drumming groups and hundreds of volunteers, the National Measles and Malaria Campaign was officially launched last week. For the Canadian Red Cross Malaria Prevention Project Team and their Sierra Leone Red Cross counterparts, the campaign was the culmination of months of work procuring and delivering nearly 900, 000 nets and training and mobilizing over 4,000 volunteers. The result of their hard work; in addition to being vaccinated against measles, receiving a vitamin A supplement and de-worming treatment, all children under five in Sierra Leone were provided with a bed-net that will offer them protection from malaria-bearing mosquitoes, significantly improving their chances of survival in this, the country with the highest infant mortality rate in the world.

It has only been two days since the end of the campaign, but already the relative calm of the Sierra Leone Red Cross office is a sharp contrast to the flurry of the past week’s activity. Following the boisterous day of the launch, nearly a thousand distribution and vaccination sites were set up in hospitals, clinics, Red Cross offices, churches, mosques, community centers, markets and street side stalls in communities and neighborhoods throughout the country.


Hundreds of thousands of mothers brought their children to distribution and vaccination sites throughout the week. Some of them, having walked for hours down dusty rural roads with their children on their backs, waited patiently in line for hours at a time to vaccinate their child and receive a net before making the journey home.

Every effort was made to ensure every child was vaccinated and received a net: Volunteers circulated door to door to inform residents, radio stations played campaign jingles, local theatre groups performed sensitization skits in the streets, notices and posters were put up, and newspaper ran articles. T-shirts worn by volunteers and staff during the week of the campaign that read ‘Use Maskita Net For Fet Malaria’ and featured an image of a child sleeping under a bed-net were seen at every turn throughout the week.

For the Red Cross Malaria Project Team, the week was filled with site visitations from representatives from the Canadian Red Cross, CIDA and the media. Visitors to the campaign included the President of the Canadian Red Cross, Jane McGowan, and its Special Ambassador, David Pratt. They had the opportunity to see first hand the distribution of the nets and to meet with the Red Cross staff and volunteers. Returning to Canada with a broad understanding of the scope and scale of the Canadian Red Cross Malaria Prevention Program, these special guests and representatives’ will be able to give Canadians a first-hand account of the work being done in Africa.

A full team effort and good coordination was required to ensure a balance was struck between the visitor agenda and the broader responsibilities of the team in supporting the Sierra Leone Red Cross with the distribution. Months of planning and coordination paid off when the distribution went off with great success. The real stars of the campaign were the Sierra Leone Red Cross volunteers who tirelessly set up sites every morning and spent each day managing sites, distributing nets, and explaining how to properly use and care for the nets. Together with their Ministry of Health counterparts they worked patiently in the heat and humidity over the cries of children to deliver a critical intervention that offers hope for a better future to thousands of children in a country desperately in need.


I spent the first part of the week checking on the urban distribution sites around Freetown. The calm, patient, and relatively small crowds lined up at hundreds of distribution sites around town were one of the greatest success stories of the campaign. Good planning and good messaging prevented overcrowding by ensuring there were enough sites and that it was clear the campaign would run for a full week.

Later in the week I made a trip inland to Bo, a major town in central Sierra Leone with a noticeably quieter feel than Freetown. Together with Doug Mole - our team Logistics Delegate, Emanuel Tommy - Deputy Secretary General of the Sierra Leone Red Cross, and Ken Porter - Program Analyst with CIDA, we checked on number of distribution sites, both urban and rural. Each site we visited had a slightly different set up but each demonstrated effective vaccination administration and net distribution. At every site we were greeted by grateful mothers, curious children and proud volunteers.

The face of Sierra Leone was apparent throughout the campaign. Its courage - visible in the children who fought back tears after receiving a vaccination, its strength - visible in its mothers who waited patiently in the heat to ensure the health of their children, and its determination - visible in the volunteers who worked tirelessly to deliver hundreds of vaccinations and nets for days on end, all gave reason to believe the future of Sierra Leone will be brighter than its recent past.

As I watched wide eyed child after child leave the distribution points clutching in one hand their mothers, in the other their newly acquired nets, I felt a cautioned sense of hope for Sierra Leone. Even as Mr. Tommy described the chaos and destruction of a conflict that ended only five years ago, it was hard not to be impressed with even the small signs of recovery.

Mr. Tommy himself offers such a sign. He speaks of the future of Sierra Leone with measured optimism – discussing how the Sierra Leone Red Cross can build off this current campaign’s partnership with the Ministry of Health and strengthen its broader health care programming. Acknowledging that malaria is only one problem faced by Sierra Leone, he has confidence that the Sierra Leone Red Cross, like the country itself, has the ability to build a better future but he understands also that it needs the support of organizations like the Canadian Red Cross and countries like Canada.

If, as I believe, all of our actions (and inactions) are unquestionably linked to the fate of humanity, than my hope is that Canadian support of this successful campaign is only one example of a broader commitment to humanitarian issues.

Trip to Bonthe

Well, to bring you up to speed a bit, I have spent the past week primarily supporting the logistics side, supporting Doug Mole. He and I have been busy overseeing the final loading of delivery trucks taking the last of the 800 000 nets out of the central warehouse and out to the Regional centres.

We recently returned from a trip to Bonthe where we went to meet with the Sierra Leone Red Cross Field Officer to check on the distribution of nets from the Regional centre to the outlying communities. Bonthe is located on an island on the southern coast requiring a six hour drive and a four hour boat ride and so provided a good opportunity to see a bit of the country outside of Freetown.

To say the roads in Sierra Leone are bad is to do it somewhat of an injustice. The broken pavement that paves most of Freetown virtually ends outside of the immediate surrounding area. The roads in most of the country are narrow dirt lanes filled with at best - potholes, at worst - vast craters that turn to impassable ponds and mud bogs with the rains.

Shacking and bouncing along in one of the trademark white Landcrusiers with Red Cross emblems I was amazed out how thick the jungle walls were on either side of the road. I immediately gained an appreciation for why it is referred to as the bush… It is so thick it like one giant, seemingly impenetrable plant. The only noticeable breaks were the cotton trees that rose stories above the rest of the jungle like huge otherworldly giants.

Along the way we passed through small rural villages that typified how different rural Sierra Leone is from urban Freetown. In Freetown the maze of streets are jammed with taxis and overflow with crowds of people carrying or selling modern wares. The streets are lined by decayed colonial buildings, the gaps between them filled by shanty dwellings.

By contrast, most villages number at most only a few hundred. They live in mud-brick homes with palm thatched roofs or occasionally made of correlated tin. Visitors and vehicles aren’t a common sight and through each village we were greeted by the smiles and waves of young children – some dressed neatly in formal school uniforms, others barely dressed at all.

The following day we arrived at the dock to board the boat that would take us to Bonthe Island. A long, low, narrow wood boat was being loaded up with the large bails of nets along with other cargo. Standing there in the relentless heat and humidity I couldn’t help but marvel at how they managed to fit it all on board… My confidence in the seaworthiness of the vessel only came it to question once they started to squeeze most of the crowd of people who stood patiently by into all crooks and corners of the craft.

Having stood out in the heat for so long I had started to feel a bit faint and Doug commented that I looked white. That got a good laugh from the locals… To them it was stating the obvious :)

Puttering along the Jong River as it fed out to the Atlantic, I looked out at the remote villages that bordered the river - seemingly cut off by not just roads but time. Further out, mangrove trees lined the banks of islands made entirely from the sand that had settled out of the river.

Surrounded by the laughter and chatter of the women on board, I played with a young girl with beautifully big eyes who had taken an interest in my finger. Her mother’s smile, like so many I have seen since I arrived, spoke volumes of the people of Sierra Leone. The signs of poverty and disease in this country are perhaps only outnumbered by the signs of the strength and spirit of its people. ‘Welcome to Sierra Leone’, the Mayor of Bonthe says to me with a warm smile and hand shake, reaching across a crowd of people on the boat. Welcome indeed.

Arrival in Freetown

Peering out the open porthole window of the rugged Sikorsky helicopter the night of my arrival I tried to catch a glimpse of the city below only to be thwarted by the near total darkness. The Atlantic Ocean, black as the storm filled night sky, blended seamlessly against the steep mountains of the dense jungle. Between them lay Freetown, evidenced only by a few specs of light but otherwise obscured by the absence of wide-scale electricity. Noting my anticipation, I conceded to the fact that despite any previous knowledge or preparation, a degree of the unknown awaited.

In this way my arrival serves as a fitting metaphor for this, my first overseas mission with the Red Cross. I have come as a Junior Delegate, and join the Canadian Red Cross delegate team in supporting the Sierra Leone Red Cross’ part in the Measles and Malaria Campaign, an integrated child survival initiative.

Still recovering and rebuilding from a brutal decade long conflict, Sierra Leone, long one of the poorest countries in Africa – the poorest continent on earth, was just recently ranked at the bottom, 176 out of 177, again this year on the UN Human Development Index.

In a country where the average life expectancy is 40, health issues have a major social and economic impact. This is why issues such as malaria have been identified by the UN in the Millennium Development Goals as critical.

In Sierra Leone there are many health issues; virtually every imaginable major disease is present here. To address them the Government of Sierra Leone is working together with non-governmental aid organization, both domestic and international. The Measles and Malaria Campaign being undertaken is an example of how many diverse partners can come together to address complex health and social issues.

The Sierra Leone Ministry of Health, WHO, and UNICEF have worked together with the Sierra Leone Red Cross who, with the support of the Canadian Red Cross, has undertaken the incorporation of Long Lasting Insecticide Treated Bed Net distribution into the existing measles vaccination campaign. With its large volunteer base the Sierra Leone Red Cross is contributing to the social mobilization of communities for vaccination and Bed Net use while the Canadian Red Cross supplies technical support and, with funding from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), the nets.

Long Lasting Insecticide Treated Bed Nets have proven to be an effective and affordable way of greatly reducing morbidity and mortality resulting from malaria when integrated with other critical interventions. When nets are distributed to the most vulnerable, children and pregnant women, all round infant mortality is significantly decreased.

Malaria is the number one killer of children under five in Africa, killing one child every 30 seconds, and Sierra Leone is one of the most affected countries. There is no vaccine for malaria and thus no ‘magic bullet’ solution. Instead a multi-pronged approach including prevention, early detection and accessible and affordable treatment is required. Interventions such as this are critical for countries such as Sierra Leone whose children deserve a better future.

So that’s a bit of background on the program… (well a bit more than a bit :) As for my role, I’m here to work with Dr. Marcy Erksine, the Africa Malaria Advisor and the rest of the Canadian Red Cross Delegate team; Colin MacKay – Project Manager, Doug Mole – Logistics, Hlin Baldvinsdottir – Finance, and Jackie Thereot – Communications Officer. All are from Canada except Hlin who is from Iceland but who is an honorary Canadian if I ever met one. When I arrived I received a warm welcome from the team, most of who have been here for six months. There is a great deal of experience amongst the group and I have already begun to learn a great deal from each of them… And on top of it, they are a fun group and always good for a laugh.

As the Canadian Red Cross’ Junior Delegate, an internship funded by CIDA, I have been fortunate to have been provided with such a unique opportunity to gain valuable first hand experience in the field of humanitarian aid. I look forward to learning as much as I can while contributing to such an important initiative but I hope also to use this opportunity to be a link to Canadians interested in international aid programs and the work of the Red Cross – especially Canadian youth. Having volunteered with the Humanitarian and Youth Programs of the Canadian Red Cross, I understand the importance of the role they play and hope to support their work in any way I can. So please, ask questions and write comments. These are simply my own thoughts and views and as such, they reflect only one of countless perspectives, so you are welcome to add your own.

P.S. Access to a computer has been a bit difficult with infrequent electricity and the amount of things going on right now but I promise to be back soon.