We are delighted to update you on the progress of the Abayudaya Community Health and Development Project.
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A Letter from Jacob Mwosuko, Chairman, Abayudaya Health Committee, Abayudaya Executive Council
Thank you so much for your excellent update about Abayudaya progress. It showed me how organized and transparent you are. I would like to tell you that all the projects which you are funding are critically important to human survival.
Water is life and sanitation is health, as the saying goes. Water, a basic human right, is at the heart of a daily crisis faced by millions of the world's most vulnerable people. This crisis threatens life and destroys livelihood on a devastating scale. Water gives life to ever thing. People need water as they need oxygen. Without both, life would be non-existent. When people are denied access to clean water, it means that their freedoms are being constrained by vulnerability and ill-health. Delivering clean water, removing wastes from water, and improving sanitation, are the three of the most basic foundations for human progress facing the Abayudaya health committee.
Among the serious issues facing our community, it has been noted that women in this community bear the brunt of the responsibility for collecting water, often spending up to four hours a day walking to springs, collecting water, and carrying it over their heads for long distances. Consequently, they waste valuable time where more productive work would have been done. It has been further realized by the committee that this has kept a number of girls out of school hence dooming them to illiteracy. Therefore, deprivation of water and sanitation perpetuates gender inequality and disempowers women.
Living without access to clean water has required the community to resort to getting water from ditches, rivers, wetlands, and lakes, which are usually polluted with human and animal excrement, hence suffering the related diseases.
Recognizing that water and sanitation deficiency is holding back advances in health, education and economic growth, the Jewish Research Institute established a special water fund to alleviate the suffering and support the members of the Abayudaya.
This means that, with access to clean water, the community expects to reduce child mortality rates by 20%. Additionally, the use of clean latrines, and flush toilets, to those who can afford them, will reduce infant death by more than 30%.
The Abayudaya Jewish community of Uganda wholeheartedly recognizes the meaningful work of the Jewish Research Institute. Long live the Jewish Research Institute, Long live our Donors, and may you be rewarded more than what you spend on this noble cause. Please continue with the struggle to save people's lives.
In the morning today I woke up to the voice of water from our water tanks. It seemed like a dream and I stood several minutes staring at the overflow and saying the Shechechyanu prayer. Tonight at Kabbalat Shabbat, we shall say the Shecheyanu prayer together with congregation. The presence of running water has created all the difference.
Rabbi Gershom Sizomu, Abayudaya Spiritual Leader
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