Medical Healthcare, Education and Economical Development For The Poorest - Medical Clinic for Street Children of Djibouti (I do not own this photo.)

The documentation “Discovery.Ch.Prehistoric.Predators.of.the.Past.1of3.What.Killed.the.Mega.Beasts.” that is available on youtube or at least was when I discovered it some months ago describes a disease that is widely spread in Africa – especially in the East. There people usually let their dogs roam free instead of walking them- They depend on their pets as hound dogs, as cattle dogs or as watchdogs which means that these canines spend most – if not all – of their time outside. By making them stay outside however their owners have endangered them, themselves and their whole family for some decades ago a deadly spread increased among wild dogs and lions. This virus transfered from these wild animals to pet dogs that entered in contact with them. The worst thing about this is that human beings also can fall ill if they enter in contact with an ill dog – and this desease kills animals and men alike. According to the movie deseases like these may already have caused the extenction of whole populations of mammals. Luckily the citizens of the endangered areas will not share this fate. According to what the narrator of this movie says some organisations paid vets to go there and give these pet dogs a serum that would make them immune to the virus. Since then the number of people and pets who died of this disease has decreased rapidly.

Reuploaded in order to get more attention: In Africa there are Christian sects that combine tribal faith and Christianity. As a result they maintain their imaginations of witches and wizzards as evil creatures, but mix it with their new faith, Christianity.
Judging by some events that took place since the beginning of this century this means that they accuse children – who are too young to defend themselves – of being witches, they mistreat them, make their parents abandon them and they sometimes even kill them or sell them into slavery. Also the exorcism practiced there is painful and harms these still developing children.
It goes without saying that what they do indeed is against Christianity and thus it’s not surprising that the first aid these kids got was safe houses run by Stepping Stones Nigeria * and their partners in Akwa Ibom state in Nigeria, by Bishop Emilio Sumbelelo of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Angola, and by Africa Outreach in Malawi *. Some however say that punishing (boycotting) these countries would be best, but it wouldn’t. Without all those deseases spreading in Africa, without all these famines we wouldn’t have this problem. Then nobody would accuse anybody of having used “black magic” to harm someone.
“http://www.hopeislife.org/archives/100.html” belongs to an organisation that helps Sam Ikpe-Itauma – a man who takes care of more than 130 of these abandoned children.

• On “http://www.steppingstonesnigeria.org/donate.html” you can learn how to get involved, too.
  
• On “http://www.africa-outreach.org/” you learn how to support them.

The “Aid by Trade Foundation” now has built a new initiative, the “Cotton Made In Africa”-initiative. As the name states they – instead of sending money or goods to Africa – try to help them by making so-called “Social Business”. That means that they don’t exploit the peasants who sell the cotton this foundation uses to make clothes, but they treat their trade partners fair and give them what they deserve. These are the principles of fair trade. If you want to support this initiative, please buy clothes that have the “Cotton Made In Africa”-label attached.
These clothes aren’t much more expensive than “normal” ones.
(For further information, please read “http://www.cotton-made-in-africa.com/en/get-involved/consumer.html”.)

The narrator of a documentatary I recently watched says that during the last few years the number of Benin people getting access to running water and electricity at least increased a little. This may help to convey a better hygienic situation there which in turn may make life expectancy increase.

>There is a lady in Kenya: When her parents forced her to marry someone she didn’t want to marry, she refused. Nor did she let them circumcize her. Without their support she left, went to school and in the end became a teacher by herself.
I just tell you this example to show you, that there also is the will to change something on the side of several natives.