Debra Ross, president of JumpStart Sudan, will help establish health clinic
Olathe, Kan. — Debra Ross often finds herself in unlikely situations.
She never thought she’d be involved with an organization striving to meet the needs of people struggling to live in Southern Sudan. Now she’s preparing to leave March 8 for a trip to Akon, Sudan near the Darfur region plagued by violence and genocide.
“I am constantly amazed at what doors will open if you are willing to go where the Lord leads you,” she said. “I got involved in this because I felt burdened to pray for those suffering in Sudan. Only the Lord knew he would allow me the opportunity to not only meet these dear people, but actually be involved in a work that is doing something to help improve their lives.”
The purpose of her trip — her second to the region — is to meet with village elders and recruit staff for a recently constructed health clinic. She’ll join Chris Garang Chol, a nursing student who returned to Akon in January on a JumpStart Sudan-sponsored trip to help train health care workers, and assist in the clinic for several months
The clinic was built on the donations of numerous churches, organizations and individuals in Olathe and the rest of the Kansas City area. Major contributors from Atlanta and Nevada and others from across the country also have supported the organization’s work.
“The clinic is something they have dreamed of and prayed for for a very long time,” Ross said. “So many people die from things that might be easily treated if there were medicine and/or treatment available.”
Prior to the health clinic, the more than 120,000 people of Akon had to walk 40 miles to find basic healthcare. Many were too sick to make the journey. Children would die of malaria. Women would die in childbirth.
The biggest killers in Sudan are malaria, diarrhea, malnutrition and respiratory illnesses. Exotic diseases, such as Guinea worm disease, river blindness, trachoma and Ebola hemorrhagic fever, also plague the people of southern Sudan.
The $135,000 facility includes a well, but much more still needs to be done to make it a functioning Primary Healthcare Unit. Medicines currently can be prescribed as doctors come and go. Ross hopes to establish a more permanent staff during her trip.
Despite violence in the region, the people of Akon have somewhat of a safety barrier in the form of three rivers surrounding the area. Therefore, the health clinic is expected to be safe from attack, too.
“There’s rivers all around it,” Ross said. “We’ve been told it would be difficult for an army to get across them in the wet season.”
JumpStart Sudan has been working in the Bahr-el Ghazal region of southern Sudan, relatively near to the Darfur region.
Akon is home to Jump-Start Sudan founder and Olathe resident Akot Arec, who currently is the personal secretary to Salva Kiir Myardit — president of the autonomous Government of Southern Sudan, and the successor to the post of Vice President of Sudan.
“He is serving in this capacity because he wants to do everything he can to help build a safer and better nation for the people who have suffered for so long,” Ross said.
Although she’s being stretched on a personal level herself, Ross said she’s enjoying her current calling in life.
“You just know you’re doing the right thing because God has done it,” she said. “I really don’t do anything. I’m just here and God brings generous people our way.”
For more information on Jump-Start Sudan, call Ross at 780-4588, e-mail her at info@jumpstartsudan.org or visit www.jumpstartsudan.org.
UPDATE: The Olathe Family Resource Center donated nearly 80 books to the children of Akon. They are currently being shipped to Sudan along with other supplies and necessities.
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