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The young man with the vitamin
deficiency
On leave in Australia from her Indian hospital, Sr Laurel Seaton is using the opportunity to raise much-needed funds. REG BARLOW
reports
Could you work in a heath care facility with window frames but because of a shortage of money and supplies the windowpanes lay on the ground waiting to be fitted?
Then,
while you are on a one-month home visit in Australia, you hear your creation had its whole electrical wiring destroyed by a high voltage surge from an unreliable power supply?
In fact, would that news be the
catalyst for you to say enough is enough after 26 years of dedicated service to underprivileged in India?
To many it may well be, but for social worker Sr Laurel Seaton that’s not an option.
Sr Laurel
is a registered nurse who, after reading an article in a church magazine in Sydney that sought volunteers to help the underprivileged in India, decided to volunteer her services in 1975.
Late in 1981 she
moved with Sr Lucy Biswas to the Indian State of Bihar in the community of Ramnagar, in the Catholic Diocese of Bettiah and set up the Village Sisters of India Society (VSI). Another two sisters, Sr Rayni Bara and
Sr Meeta Topprio, joined them to create a team of four.
They were helped by three charities to set up the health centre, named St Joseph’s Home of Compassion. But as usual, in all such ventures that depend on
charity, money often runs out as do volunteer trades people to do the work.
That hasn’t stopped four very dedicated people. The Village Sisters of India Inc help those who the caste system in India literally
won’t touch.
Many of the horrific cases encountered by these very dedicated women are never seen in an Australian hospital.
One example is a young boy so malnourished his skin is similar to that of a
scaly snake.
Another is a man who had his face mauled by a bear. Another man was riding on the top of a train carriage and was nearly garrotted by an overhead wire, falling like a bouncing apple down a
hillside and literally left to die alone.
And then there are women with faces almost eaten away by cancer or presenting with severe gynaecological problems that men completely ignore.
The malnourished
boy was given Vitamin A and D tablets and rubbed with Vitamin E cream for 10 years and is now married and living a normal and healthy life with not a blotch on his skin.
Sr Laurel describes herself as the
primary beggar for this charitable work. And she uses a newsletter to try to raise desperately needed funds for getting the heath centre completed, to get much needed medical equipment and to pay a doctor which
costs $A1,000 a month.
She urgently needs an electrician who would be willing to rewire the health centre which once suffered a 14-month blackout.
If their patients die, the sisters bury them at their
own expense without any fanfare nor much needed help.
There are moves to have the Australian government make donations to Sr Laurel’s work tax deductible, a factor which more often than not is the difference
between people putting their hands in their pockets or deciding against donating much needed funds.
Anyone interested in helping in a practical sense by going to Ramnagar to work on the health centre
or wishing to donate money can contact Nevin or Marie Holland on 6383-3542. (Mrs Holland is Sr Laurel’s sister).
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