KITGUM: St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Kitgum municipality is seeking 35 million shillings to make special toilets and renovate a care centre for children suffering from nodding syndrome.
In December 2021, St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Kitgum municipality announced that it was in the final stages of setting up a care centre for children suffering from nodding syndrome.
The care center, an initiative of Archbishop John Baptist Odama, is intended to cater to at least 259 most vulnerable children with nodding children in all districts in the Acholi sub region.
The care center is located at St. Bakhita, a former secondary school located in Pongdwongo parish in pager division, Kitgum municipality.
Stephen Oyet, the chairperson of the care center, told Uganda Radio Network in an interview that the responsibility of renovating the rundown facility is being shouldered by mainly volunteers, the parish priest of the church and well-wishers.
Oyet explains that remodelling work is only partly doe, because they are yet to get money to make special toilets that can be used while sitting, and evee mobile ones, to suit the condition of the users.
Oyet says another task is to paint rooms and dormitories and work on the floors of the rooms. He appeals to everyone in the community to assist in any way they can so that the centre can start housing the children by June this year.
The 2022-2027 strategic plan of the care centre is to, among other things, enhance health care and medication of nodding syndrome victims, provide physiotherapy and language therapy, improve food, nutrition, and income security, promote research on food and behavior, and provide spiritual support and vocational skills training to those who have recovered.
The full involvement of the church in caring for children with nodding syndrome comes after two centres in Odek sub-county in Omoro district and Tumanguu in Labongo Akwang sub-county in Kitgum district that were offering specialised treatment to the children closed.
Since the closure of these care centers, a number of patients with nodding syndrome have died due to malnutrition-related complications, drowning, and fires.