Stealing the Food Right Out of Her Body
Update: Food for the Hungry is responding to the devastating earthquake in Haiti. Find out more.
She was 15 months old when Food for the Hungry staff convinced her grandmother to take Michelle to the Hope for Haiti health clinic. Michelle clearly had experienced a rough start in life. She weighed only six pounds and lacked the energy even to lift her head as healthcare workers skeptically examined her.
“They had very little hope she would survive,” says Claude, a Food for the Hungry staffer in Haiti.
Michelle’s mother died months earlier, so her grandmother did her best to provide. But she didn’t know to wash her hands before feeding Michelle. As a result, parasitic worms robbed up to 25% of what little Michelle ate.
They had very little hope she would survive.
—Claude
Worms infect about 800 million school age children worldwide—simply by drinking or stepping into contaminated water, or, like Michelle, eating food prepared by someone who didn’t wash their hands first. Infected children become malnourished and grow sicker and weaker with each passing week. They become physically and intellectually stunted, and many die. On average, it costs about a nickel to cure one child!
Michelle and her grandmother received deworming medication, and the transformation in both of them is astonishing!
What We Do
Food for the Hungry began long-term development work in Haiti in 2008. In addition to coordinating with Food for the Hungry’s nearby Child Development office in the Dominican Republic (5 minutes from the border of Haiti), Food for the Hungry staff walk with more than 150 churches in Haiti to equip them to reach out in their communities and meet the physical and spiritual needs of community members.
FH GLOBAL
