Golden Knowledge about Wowie Malawi!!!

Seeing as how I've been here for almost 3 weeks and I have yet to inform you all of the specifics of where I now live, I figured it was finally time for a lesson. So, if you're ready, read on my dear friends.

The Republic of Malawi is a democratic, densely populated country located in the southeastern region of Africa. It borders Zambia, Mozambique, and Tanzania. The national language is Chichewa, although those who are fortunate enough to attend school learn English. Malawi gained its independence from the UK on July 6, 1964 (so it's looking like I'll be celebrating my Independence Day along with my lovely Malawian friends). Almost 13 million people live on 46,000 square miles. Malawi has a GDP per capita of 596 US dollars. Its 3 most important export crops are tobacco, tea, and sugar.

For the ones who are fortunate enough to earn a living in Malawi, most are earning between $0.30 and $0.70 cents per day. Subsistence farming is the way of life--people try to grow enough food on their property in order to feed their families. Malawi is the one of the poorest countries in the world. The life expectancy is around 36 years old, and the number has been steadily dropping over time due to the country's impoverishment, which is constituted by the following factors: insufficient nutrition, lack of access to medical care, low income (less than $1 a day), extreme lack of foresight by the government, insufficient school education, spread of HIV/AIDS, government economic restrictions, corruption, and climate change. Out of every 10 children born in Malawi, 1 does not survive. 14.2% of the population is HIV positive, so about 1 out of every 7 people I see is infected. Health clinics are always jammed packed with mothers and their children who are dying because of very preventable illnesses--mainly diarrhea, respiratory illness, and malaria. Many of these mothers have spent months and months of income just trying to get to a heath clinic, again because the area is so rural.

The hospital that CHDI is building is going to be amazing for the entire Neno district. The current facility is about 2500 square feet and sees more than 200 patients everyday, with a staff of 3 (the most senior of which is a 2nd year med student in the U.S. until the PIH doctors came--yeah!). The Clinton Foundation is partnering with an organization called Partners In Health, and together with the Malawian Government, they are building a 60 bed hospital that will employ 150 people, including 30 nurses and 15 highly educated MDs. As many as 100,000 people in the Neno district (and beyond) will have access to free healthcare and free prescriptions drugs, including ARVs (anti-retroviral) and other first and second-line drugs that fight HIV and AIDS. In the past, very few health centers, if any, had access to these life-saving drugs. Did you know that a person with HIV/AIDS can live a perfectly normal life for 30 years or longer, once they get on ARVs? These people will be much more likely to die from heart disease or other cause of death than HIV/AIDS. I quickly learned that access is the number one preventive measure against unnecessary deaths. If the drugs that we now have access to reach the people they are supposed to help, many illnesses can be helped, cured, and even prevented.

The communities are extremely simple and very small--one school, one health clinic, one outdoor market, and a slew of mud huts. There are no paved roads in Neno, and no locals drive a car. A few people have bicycles, but the main way of transport is by foot. Where I live (in Neno Boma), I am at about 4,000 square feet and surrounded by mountainous villages. The land here is so beautiful it looks fake. I wish you could all come visit me and see for yourselves how incredibly beautiful Malawi is--the land and especially the people!!!