Ethical Travel - Leprosy Today
A Modern Take on Leprosy and New Hope
This month Jen takes you on a tour of a disease that stopped many of our ancestral travellers from making it beyond a quarantined island. In September Ethical Travel revolves around Leprosy and how you, as international backpackers, can help put an end to this.
Story Highlights
- New Hope
- What’s Been Achieved
- The History
- How You Can Help
The Basic Information
When you think of leprosy, what springs to mind? Disfigured victims? Contagion? Death? Broken down - Leprosy is a bacterial disease that damages nerves close to the surface of the skin. This leads to numbness in external body parts, such as fingers, toes, hands and feet, and further disfigurement, depending on the severity of the condition. The numbness can be so severe that sufferers can burn their extremities, develop blisters and never even feel the pain.
The disease primarily affects developing countries in the south of Europe and India. Of the estimated twelve million patients, four million live on the Indian sub-continent.
New Hope
The charity is completely reliant on volunteers . . .
New Hope is an Australian charity which aims to stamp out Leprosy and the false cultural stigmas, attached to this curable disease. They give vital medical care and treatment to thousands of Leprosy patients, as well as disabled and homeless children, in Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Tamal Nadu.
Maggie Nolan is a nurse from Australia who has supported the New Hope community for 17 years. She has seen it grow from ten staff to an organisation of more than 350 people. The charity is completely reliant on volunteers and it is the generosity of dedicated Indians and Australians that has made the remarkable achievements of New Hope, possible.
What’s Been Achieved
In Orissa, over 500,000 children and adults and over 400 remote tribal villages have benefited from New Hope projects. The Broometime Lodge in Tamil Nadu was built for Tsunami victims but now it’s a New Hope rehabilitation centre for widowed women and young girls, who no longer have any male members in their family. New Hope helps these women make a living so that they do not have to turn to prostitution and begging to survive.
So far the centre has helped 23 women to start their own businesses as tailors, weavers and screen printers but the Lodge needs $5000 a year to keep running. This may not sound like much but in terms of donations, this is a massive amount.
This is the only house of its kind in the area, to open its doors to any child in need.
Another case study showcasing the charity’s achievements is the centre for disabled children - Namaste House. This is the only house of its kind in the area, to open its doors to any child in need. The programmes at the Emergency Shelter for homeless children, living, begging and working on railway platforms, are also recognised and funded by Comic Relief and Railway Children UK.
The History
New Hope was set up in 1985 and continues to offer care and reconstructive surgery to Leprosy and Polio sufferers. It also immunizes women and children and is successfully reducing the rates of infant mortality, in areas of India where they were at astoundingly high levels.
The charity gives career training to homeless children in Visakhapatnam . . .
How You Can Help
Why not hold a sponsored event or a calorie laden cake sale and give the proceeds to New Hope? Anything you can do to help and promote the charity will make a difference.
Nurse Maggie Nolan has written a book about her experiences and those of the women she has helped. It’s called Sister, Sister - the lives of two women and is available to buy through PayPal.
All proceeds from the book go towards business opportunities and treatments for women with Leprosy.
Maggie also speaks at conferences, clubs and schools so if you fancy drumming up support for this worthwhile charity and would like Maggie to discuss her work, please send her an e-mail - maggiesister@newhopeaustralia.org.
- Jen Page
