I'm writing to you today on a cell phone modem and a solar charged laptop from the one and only official home of the Organic Health Response, the Ekialo Kiona Center at Kitawi Beach. I hope to provide semi-weekly updates over the course of the summer, so that all our supporters have a sense of the ways that their energy is contributing to our mission.

I've been back on the Island for one week and my cup is really overflowing.  Its wonderful to back among old friends, introducing our student volunteers from the University of California San Francisco to the Ekialo Kiona family, and getting down to business with a summer full of hard work, research and service.  Its very inspiring to see our vision materializing, and our ideas beginning to have a real impact in the lives of the families and people we've come to know and come to care for greatly. 

EK Center is now operational and the place is beautiful. Big, cool ferro-cement domes over the office, and high open ceilings with wind vents in the computer and seminar rooms. The EK Ferro-Cement Crew has done a wonderful job (Thanks Gabby, Adam, Mike, Ochieng, and Sam!). We have not yet finished the roof over the VCT block, so our offices are serving for now as counseling and testing rooms.  Each day more and more members have been coming to join our Voluntary Counseling and  HIV Testing Club. To date we have over 350 Members. Each member joins by going through a specialized HIV Counseling and Testing session. I received unofficial news yesterday that we are currently the leading stand-alone VCT center in Suba District for monthly intake.  Not bad for our first month of operation! Last night about 200 of us piled into our hall to watch the World Cup final on satellite TV and our new projector. We rocked the house until midnight, and I'd say pretty much everyone was rooting for Spain.

We are still waiting for the arrival of our computers and solar panels. Expectations are really growing, the community is eager. I think once we have them installed our membership is really going to skyrocket. The community is so excited to be wired, and I really want our members to be able to start signing up for emails and corresponding with their friends in the US.  We're being patient with our partners in Nairobi who are also working hard to bring the hardware and connectivity that we need out here on the Island. 

I've been very encouraged to see all the Ekialo Kiona groups that remain active and dedicated to helping build solidarity and hope within their communities.  The EK Women's Crafts Cooperative has been meeting each Friday, beading jewelry, recycling paper into journals and books, and showing an example to all of us on the possibilities of positive living.  The EK Organic Farm, coordinated by Joel Oguta, is going to begin making fence and irrigation improvements this month, and we're designing a future nutrition program for HIV-affected families. The EK Youth Radio team has also been meeting each week, we've organized journalism clubs in the area secondary schools, and we look forward to going on air within the next year. 

Lake Victoria remains cool and inviting, however the catch is significantly down this year. The Fisheries department is promoting fish farming very heavily and we're making place to promote our own specialized version of aquaculture/agriculture designed by Matthew Tierney.  We'll keep you posted.

We're also very fortunate to have 8 medical, pharmacy, nursing, social work, and public health students from the University of California in San Francisco.  We've designed a community health baseline research study, in partnership with the Kenyan Medical Research Institute.  We've spent the last week training a group of 20 local research volunteers and staff who will work with us to complete the study. Its been a great workshop, the first official seminar series within the EK Seminar room.

That's it for now from Lake Victoria.  Thanks again for all your encouragement and support, it really means a lot to us out here on Mfangano. 

over and out from Kenya,

Chas Salmen

The Ekialo Kiona Center officially opened on June 10, 2010 on Mfangano Island!  In celebration of the World Cup, we are featuring the World Cup Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) program for the next 5 weeks. With our new projector purchased with help from the Rotary Clubs in Kisumu, Ft. Collins, and Glenwood Springs, Colorado, OHR is providing big screen World Cup viewing to all members of the Ekialo Kiona Club. Members join this unique club by learning their own HIV-status through a specialized counseling and testing session with OHR's newly hired VCT counselors. On our first day of counseling and testing we registered over 120 club members, a Mfangano Island record for a single day of VCT testing!  With our partners at the FAMILY AIDS Care and Education Services program, we are ensuring that all HIV-positive friends receive an appropriate and effective treatment.  The Ekialo Kiona vision is off to a great start thanks to the hard work of our ferro-cement construction crew, dedicated staff, and countless volunteers in the US and Kenya.  Special thanks to Lauren Friedman, Adam Sewall, and Richard Magerenge for their tireless efforts and steady teamwork to help OHR reach this important milestone.

www.hesperian.org

We met this cool group at a UCSF Global Health Conference.  They will be providing some innovative literature for the library in the Ekialo Kiona Center. 

Look for OHR on their blog in the near future!

http://hesperian.typepad.com/weblog/

Hesperian is a non-profit publisher of books and newsletters for community-based health care. Their first book, Where There Is No Doctor, is considered one of the most accessible and widely used community health books in the world. Simply written and heavily illustrated, Hesperian books are designed so that people with little formal education can understand, apply and share health information. Developed collaboratively with health workers and community members from around the world, their books and newsletters address the underlying social, political, and economic causes of poor health and suggest ways groups can organize to improve health conditions in their communities.

Building The "EK"-- A Local Endeavor...

(Gabby, Adam, Okiki, Okoth, and Ochieng: The EK Ferro-Cement Crew)

If you’ve ever been to Kenya (some may accurately generalize – anywhere in Africa), you know that time is rarely of the essence.  When you plan to meet a friend at 1pm, you know never to show up punctually at 1pm because you WILL wait anywhere from 30 minutes up to 2 hours for your friend to finally arrive.

In 2008, when we set our building completion date for December 1st, 2009 – in celebration of World AIDS Day – we knew we were setting ourselves up for a challenge.  We gave ourselves 1 full year to design and build a solar powered community center … on a remote island in the middle of Lake Victoria, with no electricity, no vehicles, and a 3-hour wooden ferryboat ride between the mainland and our site at Kitawi Beach on Mfangano Island. We also decided to build this center as from our community---no outside contracting firms... We decided to build the EK center from local designs, with local sand and stones, with 100% local labor, and through local leadership.

Back in 2008, Adam Sewall, one our Kenya-based construction crew leaders and OHR founders, had highly recommended using an eco-friendly yet extremely durable building technique using ferro-cement.  Its economical advantages and sustainable characteristics made it a desirable option for our vision of building – in its broadest sense - a long-lasting, ecologically sound, community owned and operated, public education and support center for the people of mfangano.

Learning the skill seemed to be invaluable to the islanders as a way to build stronger structures with less material. Ferro-cement took the cake and we all jumped aboard. Before we knew it, ferroism had taken over and we were all eating off of ferro-cement forks and wearing ferro-cement shoes.

So far, we’ve encountered only a few bumps along the way.  Designed, built, and managed almost entirely by Kenyans, we are extremely proud of our work thus far. We continue to work hard to complete the roof, windows, doors, and interior details.

If you happen to be in the area (Mfangano Island, Lake Victoria, Kenya) stop in for a tour of the building, a game of football, and most importantly, a warm welcome. Our next steps of interior set-up and program implementation will begin in the Spring of 2010.

(Nearly Finished...)

World AIDS Day:

World AIDS Day is celebrated on December 1st. The World AIDS Day theme for 2009 is ‘Universal Access and Human Rights. December 1st is an opportunity to increase awareness of HIV/AIDS, as well as a reminder of the education and commitment needed to eradicate this disease. OHR is hosting a large World AIDS Day event at the new Ekialo Kiona Center at Kitawi Beach. 

The Ekialo Kiona Center will provide access to resources to encourage young people and residents to get tested and know their HIV status.  It is centered around improving access to care and increasing education through free high-speed internet access, as well as a library and study room.   World AIDS Day and the opening of Ekialo Kiona Center provide a chance to generate enthusiasm worldwide to work towards an end to HIV/AIDS and is the beginning of an opportunity on Mfangano Island to stimulate discussion, reduce stigma, and connect this island community with communities around the globe. 

A Unique Partnership: The OHR-GMCP Initiative for HIV/AIDS

The OHR-GMCP Initiative for HIV/AIDS represents a unique partnership between the Organic Health Response and the Global-Micro Clinic Project (GMCP).  GMCP is a global organization that seeks to catalyze integrated health solutions around the globe using the power of an organic social network.  The partnership recognizes a shared vision for activating the force of social solidarity to implement sustainable community health strategies.  Through this partnership OHR is providing the necessary institutional, physical, and human infrastructure on Mfangano Island, Kenya that will support GMCP to implement the worlds first Micro-Clinic pilot for people living with HIV/AIDS.

This pilot program and partnership represents a best practices collaboration with a focus on scalability and expansion for similarly affected communities across East Africa and the globe.  In the past year, OHR has recruited a diverse team of  public health expert, researchers, and student volunteers in the US and UK to contribute energy towards health experts, research, and service projects for OHR and GMCP.  “The OHR-GMCP Initiative for HIV/AIDS” now represents a coalition of staff and volunteers based in the US that will support a local partnership between OHR and GMCP on the ground in Kenya.

Academic Collaborations:

A group of students at the University of California San Francisco have proposed a research project to measure the potential impact of the Organic Health Response on the overall health of HIV-affected communities on Mfangano Island.  Their scientific evaluation will evaluate program effectiveness and determine potential scalability of OHR pilot programs for similarly affected communities across Lake Victoria, sub-Saharan Africa, and beyond.

The overall objective of this study is to gather comprehensive qualitative and quantitative data in four general Domains to establish a community-wide health baseline for the long-term evaluation of OHR’s indigenous HIV/AIDS initiatives on Mfangano Island, Suba District, Kenya.  Broadly, the four Domains of this baseline investigation include:  Health Literacy, Attitudes and Support; Utilization of Biomedical and Traditional Health Resources; and Nutrition and Water Security; HIV/AIDS Disease Status.

This baseline study aims to: