Shine on You Crazy Diamond

Syd Barrett the founding member of Pink Floyd died Tuesday at the age of 60. I have to pay my respects to him for the great music he created with the rest of the band! Work has been going well we are preparing to conduct a mass bed net dipping campaign. We will have over 200 dipping sites were people can bring their bed nets to be dipped in insecticide that repels mosquitoes. We are still in the planning stages which is about as exciting as it sounds but it will be crucial for the success of our campaign. We are working out the logistics like how to advertise for the campaign and how to acquire the materials needed. One major problem we are facing is data collection. At each site we would like to record how many nets were dipped and who will be sleeping under the net. This is very difficult because we are relying on volunteer help and many volunteers are illiterate or at least have some difficulty with reading and writing. This means when we create our data collection sheets we must make them as basic as possible so people will be able to understand them. In the past volunteers were payed for their work but this year there is no money to pay the volunteers. This has significantly reduced the number of volunteers from last year. People here are used to getting payed for their work and don't fully understand the concept of working for free. To overcome this obstacle we have decided to ask the Peer Health educators in the Schools to help us. The students are required to do community service as part of their Peer Health program so we are asking the students to come through and help us. I spent the entire day today traveling around to many schools asking the Peer Health Educators for help. So far we have successfully recruited about 60 kids. We hope to start advertising the campaign starting Monday so time is running short but with the help of the PHE's I think this campaign will be a success. Way to go kids!!!!!!!! Ciao