The typhoon season of the Philippines has started amidst a rampaging coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. The first typhoon, Vongfong, with strong winds of 155 kph (96 mph) and torrential rains pounded the country while on strict lockdown.

It placed the health system of the Philippines into a test as a perfect storm developed—a strong typhoon during a devastating pandemic. In a country of 110 million people, Vongfong displaced populations and knocked out power, thus complicating the COVID-19 initiatives and adding additional burden to the emergency situation of the country. The Philippines is hit by an average of twenty tropical typhoons every year.

It may be recalled that the country is still reeling from the effects of super typhoon Haiyan on November 8 of 2013 that killed 6200 people, displacing 4 million and affecting 14 million from its destructive force.  And the Electric Co-op of Aparri in North Luzon is still often offline because of Typhoon Ompong in 2018.

A FAME partner Hospital, Charles W. Selby Memorial Hospital in Aparri, has at risk outdoor temporary Triage areas and treatment areas because of COVID-19.  Additionally, your partner in Aparri has an outdated, under-sized, and over-used generator. Many years ago, the hospital-acquired a small generator just for Emergencies.  Usually a temporary solution, this generator has now become a near-permanent provider of electricity for critical care patients with the ongoing and common Electricity Crisis in the Philippines. When the electricity is out only portions of the hospital are able to have power.

The following Departments are in crisis during these Outages:

• Pediatric Respiratory
• Dialysis
• Heart Monitoring
• COPD and Asthma

All of these patients are all at risk many times.

With your partnership FAME can provide a New Generator which will adequately power the full hospital if needed!

This FAME Partner Hospital is 100% Filipino-led and 99% self-funding for daily operations – an example of Sustainability!  Chaplains at this hospital boldly declare the gospel to EVERY patient who enters!

Can you partner with FAME with a gift to Sustainable Projects that will bring Power to the Philippines?  Power for Healthcare and Power from the Gospel!

Dear Friends and Partners of FAME,

Do you remember the Earth, Wind & Fire song from 1978, “September”?

Ba de ya, say do you remember?
Ba de ya, dancing in September
Ba de ya, never was a cloudy day     (are you humming it now?)

Do you remember last September? Do you remember what it was like to live in a world without an unrelenting pandemic, an increase in racial tensions, masks, getting together with family and friends, going to church, going to school, going to work, receiving medical care, volunteering, attending sporting events, going on a vacation, going on a mission trip, and no “social distancing”?

Last September, as well as other Septembers, seem like dreams compared to the world we live in now. So much has changed as we look at the current world we live in. What has not changed is the love of our God and He being with us through all of this.

Recently, FAME Executive Director, Bill Warren said, “Even though several FAME  short-term medical mission trips this year have been canceled and some of our Sustainable Healthcare Projects are “on hold” because of mandated lockdowns, God is still at work!  We have heard from so many of our partners with stories of their unique opportunities to reach out and help people in their communities during a pandemic. One partner in India is waiting for the pandemic to end so they can continue work on this desperately needed primary care clinic.  Today it is just a foundation but soon it will be a place where people will find help and hope – both physically and spiritually.  In the meantime, they are feeding people who are hungry, and I recently saw pictures of the baptisms of six people.”

There are great needs among our partners, and this month we invite you to partner with us in praying for many of them and the medical projects we have committed to funding for their missions.

Other items of prayer for this month include our FAME scholarship recipients who are studying to become medical professionals, FAME’s short-term mission trips that are currently scheduled for 2021, some upcoming conferences that will now be virtual instead of in person, volunteer groups, and some church visits where Jeff Coon, FAME Director of Development will be presenting FAME and how churches can partner with us in reaching the lost through medical evangelism.

Please know that we are grateful to you and your partnership. Your prayers are making a difference in lives around the world.

Many blessings to all of you!

Click here for the September Prayer Calendar

Laboratories and lab workers are currently one of the most important medical needs of our times.

In 2017 many FAME partners helped to send funding to Narok County, Kenya in order to establish a state of the art laboratory that was ahead of the standards required in Kenya.  This lab upgrade was needed for critical testing from AIDS to every other medical unknown in the network known as CHP Kenya.  7 Clinics are served by this lab allowing medical providers to have test results in hours or just a few days, instead of weeks.

You won’t be surprised that we learned last week that the caseload at this lab has increased. Official COVID testing is being sent to a Kenya Medical research institute, but the whole region would have had no information without you and your generosity!

Additionally, you have helped provide pathologists because of FAME’s Impact Scholarship program.

In the US there are 7 pathologists for every 100,000 people; in Sub-Saharan Africa that number is less than 1 for every 500,000!

Thank you for your impact on providing Access to the Good news around the world.   One obstacle you help eliminate is by providing access to healthcare information and technology!

Thank you for your part in this battle of bringing access to the Gospel through access to healthcare.

YOU are making a difference around the globe.

 

 

You have FAME global partners who go where most won’t go!  The Democratic Republic of the Congo is one of those places.  The State Department website has the following travel warnings.

Do Not Travel To:

• The Democratic Republic of the Congo – COVID-19
• North Kivu and Ituri provinces due to terrorism
• The eastern DRC region and the three Kasai provinces (Kasai, Kasai-Oriental, Kasai-Central) due to crime, civil unrest, armed conflict and kidnapping
• Équateur province due to Ebola.

But that hasn’t stopped one of your FAME partners from acquiring medical supplies and equipment to support 7 clinics in the DR of the Congo!  In July we received word how some mobility supplies were distributed:

We praise God for what our team of 3 church leaders did last Friday by giving in the village of Ngunda Kinzamba a free gift of mobility (PET cart, personal energy transport) to a leg disabled man to show him the love of God. On Saturday they gave another PET cart to a leg disabled lady in Mukedi village.

Last week, the team picked up a truckload of additional mobility supplies to distribute. Also, of interest to you might be that Barry Reed, our Director of Mission Resources, prepared 6 surgical kits for the team.  6 of the 7 Clinics have qualified staff capable of small surgeries.  I was most surprised to learn that the supplies received included hospital-grade mattresses.  Currently, those who have these small surgeries in a few of those clinics are on the ground. These mattresses will be such an upgrade for these patients!  Their recovery time is when many respond to the gospel!

Each and every day- YOUR partnership improves the doors that open for the gospel!

Thank you for your generosity, prayers, and compassion- you are impacting the world’s most sick who would never have the chance to hear the gospel without you!

Unreported during this pandemic is the ongoing plight of the North African Refugees coming into Spain.  Spain received a lot of press early this year when the Virus numbers were spiraling out of control, but the North African Refugees are still unnoticed and under-served!

One of your FAME global partners, Dr. Erick and his wife Sira, are on the very frontlines caring for the world’s most impacted and neglected in Spain.

Before the pandemic, New Clinic plans were finalizing (The Hope Center Medical Clinic is one of FAME’s Sustainable Projects currently seeking full funding) and preparing to meet the medical needs of Refugees from North Africa!  The Church was growing and training new leaders!  Teaching Spanish to refugees and meeting the needs of these vulnerable from the crisis in North Africa.

 **Note:  In 2019 nearly 50,000 immigrants/refugees from North Africa came into Spain!

During the pandemic, Dr. Erick and the young churches there near Murcia, Spain focused on helping families by bringing food into their homes.  One woman is reported to have done all she could to find a way to eat once a day if she can.  Dr. Erick treats these refugees with the kindness and love of Christ every day.  Their situation is hopeless without the kindness of the churches connected with the future Hope Center Clinic!

Can you continue to pray for your FAME global partners like Dr. Erick and Sira’s family?  Being from Nicaragua, Dr. Erick has asked prayer for his family since his father passed away in July from COVID-19 in Nicaragua while Erick and Sira’s family was serving in Spain!  Your FAME global partners are heroes on the frontlines!

Your partnership makes a difference in the lives of your global partners and on the world’s most impacted whom they serve!

Constructing new bathing and dressing facility for Mozambique staff to use after removing PPE before leaving the property

Thank you for caring about the world’s most impacted!  One of your FAME global partners is 1 in a Million…literally 1 in 1.2 million people; read below!

In the last months, you have resourced and supplied 133 shipments to your FAME global partners with the supplies they need to respond to the current global health crisis.

Responding to the Global health crisis is what you and FAME have done for years.  But as you know, this has been an unprecedented season.  One of your global partners to whom we have shipped supplies this Spring gave us this report and the end of June!

All of the patients in Nampula, (city of 1,200,000) Mozambique which need to be hospitalized are in our hospital, the only COVID treatment site other than the Capital city.  At this time none of them have needed the ventilator which FAME provided.  But we are just getting started.  In the next few months, we expect 240,000 to contract the virus in our city. On the first day, the virus appeared in three disparate parts of the city, all of them mud hut neighborhoods. Then it took off, as I had originally expected it to do in Africa. In the first 15 days, it was multiplying with a doubling time of fewer than 3 days. Because of the explosive spread taking place in Nampula, our country rose quickly to the 8th highest position among the nations of the world in terms of the rapidity of COVID spread.

At this point, you and FAME have been able to meet the needs presented to us from your global partners.  Here is part of the unknown which is to come –the majority of your global partners report that they have been overwhelmed with feeding the starving in their communities.  Providing food for the most impacted has become a health crisis for partners in Asia, Africa, Central, and South America.  Medical Providers have been some of the only people allowed on the roads to deliver food to remote churches.

From the reports we are receiving, these countries which have been under such serious lockdowns, the spread of the virus has been a secondary crisis.  Can you continue to pray and support FAME in order for us together to be most responsive to the needs as they come to us?

You are “one in a million” to us at FAME- may be an idiom…but your impact is not- every dollar you give to FAME touches at least one of the world’s most impacted by disease and hopelessness; like this Nampula hospital which is the only one among a million!

Opening up.  Closing back down.  Re-opening again.  Here in America this global health crisis still has so many unknowns.  Wear a mask, don’t wear a mask.  Sanitize and go, or just stay home!  We are still figuring it all out!

In the countries where YOU have FAME global partners, there is less unknown.  It’s known very clearly that the medical systems are under-prepared.  In many regions, YOUR global partner hospitals, clinics, and mobile clinics ARE better prepared than some of the government facilities.  Why?  BECAUSE OF YOU AND YOUR FAITHFUL PARTNERSHIP!

But the need is still great- and your continued partnership is serving those still on the frontlines. 

In Central America, partners are preparing for clinics to take COVID-19 patients when Hospitals turn them away!

In S.E. Asia the economic impact of national shutdowns has caused millions to have a lack of food; which leads to multiple health complications your FAME partners are treating. 

In Sub-Saharan Africa, the spread of the Coronavirus has been mostly in urban areas…but FAME is hearing needs from partners in country after country. As requests for medical equipment and supplies increase in this region- You and FAME will send life-saving responses! 

This month, two 40’ shipping containers will be loaded and shipped.  Dozens of smaller shipments and loads of supplies will be leaving the country – YOU ARE still on the Frontlines! 

Thank you for your partnership- with it FAME and YOU are still keeping the Front lines prepared for this battle.  The GOOD NEWS is that in this battle, FAME, You, and our global partners are ‘ARMED WITH’ the GOOD NEWS that only Jesus brings.  

Thank you for your partnership!

Dear Friends and Partners of FAME,

As we begin another month full of uncertainty and change, let me first tell you what will not change, our gratitude for you and your support through prayer. This has been a season of struggle for almost all around the world. Whether it be through sickness, hunger, finances, loneliness, or just unrest, we have all been touched by this pandemic in some way. Your prayers have made a difference in lives around the world.

And though we may not see the constant news reports as we did a few months back, the virus is still prevalent among us and is now reaching developing countries around the world in force. Charles Franzén, of World Relief recently stated, “The health care systems in these countries are completely unprepared and incapable of mounting a reasonable clinical response of anything comparable to the U.S. response,” said , “There will continue to be significant health challenges especially around the capacity of health clinics, and we anticipate an acute challenge around food security and food supplies as well.

Mission partner, E.K. Durairaj in India said, “In the meantime, it’s mostly the people who depend on daily wage jobs, agriculture and labor’s for livelihood are the most affected economically. They struggle to make ends meet. The poor, old aged and children are struggling for their daily bread.” And that is not the only mission partner who we have heard state that hunger has become an issue. Many people in developing countries live day to day, depending on that day’s wages for that day’s food. As countries have “locked down”, thousands of people have not been able to work, leaving many to go without food for days on end.

This month, we ask that you continue to partner with us, as we pray for so many of our mission partners around the world, who for some are now just starting to see Covid at their front door. In Honduras, the situation has become critical. Felipe Colby of His Eyes just recently stated, The clinic is supposed to be closed in 13 minutes, this is currently the parking lot (it’s full). Pray for us…things are getting worse, and at an alarming rate. More will be going hungry with the further tightening of restrictions, and more are getting sick clearly (from COVID-19 and from a lot of other things) and there are fewer safe options for medical help. We need more money to distribute more food, and we are going to need to invest more in the clinic just to try to keep up with the need, and to do our best to keep our staff safe as best we can while meeting this ongoing challenge.

Because of so many of FAME’s faithful supporters, FAME will be sending a container of medical supplies to help meet those needs in Honduras later this month. We are also sending a container of medical supplies to Haiti. Now more than ever, these supplies that will be sent will SAVE LIVES. And for those that will be treated, they will be treated in the name of Jesus.

So again, THANK YOU for your prayers. Many of our mission partners around the world are going through struggles that they have never seen. Please pray for strength and guidance as they go through this season and pray that the people that will be treated by our mission partners will see the love of Jesus in the care they are provided.

Blessings in the coming month.

Click here for the July Prayer Calendar

Not a News Flash:  Other Diseases haven’t taken a vacation during the COVID-19 global pandemic- No surprise to you I’m sure; your FAME global partners are READY for IMPACT!  (Read on to see how YOU can participate!)

Although there have been many reports from your global partners reporting that people were avoiding hospitals and clinics…their additional diseases and conditions haven’t stopped!

Tuberculosis, cholera, malaria, and measles are infectious diseases still ravaging developing countries.  Many organizations (UN, WHO, and others) have targeted them as the top 4 diseases to eradicate by 2030!  Heart disease, diabetes, injuries, and infections all need treatment!  Those diseases and others have not slowed down or taken a vacation.

In the last week, one partner in Honduras reported 3 Dengue Fever cases in teens they transported in the Ambulance funded by

you!  Another partner close to FAME in Mexico reported 4 deaths and many hospitalizations from Dengue Fever (mosquito-borne illness) in their area of influence.  In Pakistan, one hospital admitted 2000 dengue patients in one week recently!

So far in 2020 over 1 million cases and 580 deaths have occurred from Dengue Fever in the Americas.  Simple solutions with treatment BUT that is when access to healthcare is available!  In Ghana, your partner building a pediatric cardiac center is in dire need of the heart care facility!  Access to Healthcare opens the door for the gospel!

While the USA is waiting for lockdowns to end and life to return to something like normal, COVID-19 AND other diseases are ravaging your partners!  Can you strengthen FAME’s position to always be READY FOR IMPACT for your FAME global partners?

Just like the diseases have never stopped, FAME’s daily operations have never stopped sending help and hope on your behalf to the world’s most vulnerable.

Can you give $100 right now to keep FAME READY FOR IMPACT as we receive daily pleas for assistance around the world?

Your $100 will impact 100 people!

YOU have sent help and hope to Partners in 32 countries this year!  Your partnership will keep them READY FOR IMPACT.

Grateful for you,

Bill Warren
Executive Director

 

Because of you nearly $50,000 in Emergency Funds and over $400K in Equipment and Supplies have been distributed during this crisis!

As the Coronavirus is expected to linger (some describe it as smolder) in Developing Countries, FAME and you are positioned to prepare our global partners with clinic upgrades, new clinics, ambulances, supplies, and even a pediatric cardiac center. Many of your FAME Global Partners are feeding starving families impacted by national lockdowns, so the need for our projects with them has intensified, and many of them have fewer funds available because of the crisis. In these times, our partnership is life-saving for the gospel and medical ministry!

FAME is prepared to move forward on 13 Sustainable Projects so that 2020 can end and 2021 can begin with solutions to the lack of access to healthcare for the world’s most vulnerable.

Here’s a report from one of your African partners. You made it possible to ship Oxygen Equipment to them in April- preparing for this crisis. Here is an excerpt:

“Also, the first COVID pneumonia patient
needing in-hospital oxygen showed up today. He is in isolation, so we are now officially open for business. Please join in praying that we will be able to help the people who will start showing up here.

This patient is a 6-year-old child with pneumonia who also tested positive for COVID – it could be that he has normal bacterial pneumonia on top of being infected with COVID, as I at least was not expecting
small children to have significant illnesses due to COVID alone.”

We wouldn’t be able to be preparing to send such Help and Hope without your partnership!

Click here for a video about how You can help!