Our dear Sanyasi has died

Sanyasi was with us in the Pickford Memorial Hospice for almost a year.

Brighter Future found Sanyasi, his brother and mother, in November 2012. Sanyasi and his family lived in a little village in Vizianagaram district. His father was an electrician and had died of AIDS in 2010. Sanyasi was 13 at the time. 
Sanyasi's mother took him to the doctors in 2009 because he had diarrhoea. It was confirmed that he had HIV. Sanyasi was started on TB treatment, a 6 months course that must be 'observed', ie. given by health professionals. He took the treatment for only 2 months. It is fairly common for TB patients to drop out of treatment as they begin to feel better and many are lost to treatment for this reason. In Sanyasi's case it was poverty, and ignorance, that prevented him getting treatment.
Sanyasi's mother had to find work to feed herself and her two sons. She could not afford to go to Vizianagaram to get the drugs for herself and her children. 

Sanyasi was started on another 6 months course for TB, by the government centre, when he came to our hospice   I remember that we were all amazed to find out that Sanyasi was 15 years old. He was so small and thin. Like so many HIV sufferers he had TB. His very muddled government records revealed that he had started TB treatment (at least twice) previously and failed to complete the courses. Sanyasi  was almost certainly MDT-TB, multi drug resistant, and unable to respond to the usual  TB treatment. 

Sanyasi was also co-infected with fungal skin infections, had hardly any hair - indicative of his malnutrition and vitamin deficiency. After a year on Brighter Future's protein rich diet and vitamin supplements, the skin infections were much improved.

 Sanyasi was unable to lie down to sleep or rest. He had developed the habit of sitting up and holding onto some adjacent support, be it a bed head or a railing, so that he could sleep sitting up. His breathing difficulty could be heard and felt as he sat on my knee  watching some of the Sue Davies Sports Ground event.

He smiled happily when we gave him his first toy to play with and also at Christmas when he asked for, and got, a remote controlled car!

He liked oranges, mango juice  and Victor made sure he got whatever he asked for.He returned to our hospice even thinner and more wasted. The hospital had told his mother to take him home to die. Brighter Future staff took it in turns to stay overnight at the hospital with him and provided for the meals and whatever  needed buying.

Sanyasi's mother stayed with him in our hospice whenever she could,   especially recently. She is also suffering relapses from her own HIV. 

His brother,Chakravarthi, was able to see him every day as he was in our Thompson House home in the same Shanti Nivas site. Sanyasi used to tell his 2 yrs younger brother, Chakravarthi,  how important it was for him to go to school. and to study well.

Brighter Future made and provided  all the burial arrangements for Sanyasi. 
Chakravarthi has gone to stay with his mother for a while while they prepare for the religious festival that follows about two weeks after a death. 
A tree will be planted to remember Sanyasi in the Shanti Nivas Memorial Garden.

[Two million people die from MDT-TB every year. In 2009 the Global TB Control reported that one in four TB deaths were HIV related and that less than 1% of MDT-TB sufferers were getting the expensive drugs they needed, especially in resource poor countries.  Many also fail to respond to the  recommended treatment.]

All children safe from cyclone Phailin

At 6pm on Sunday Victor confirmed that all Brighter Future children and staff are well and not affected by cyclone Phailin which hit Southern Odisha. Our Pastor's brother lives in a colony near Behrampur in the cyclone path, so he will take a team of our staff with him to help out at the colony. They will take food, cooking oil, matches and drinking water packets.
The surge in sea level meant that many fishermen in the Srikakalum District lost their nets and mud huts - their livlihood.

 Round thatched huts and dried fish in a Srikakulam village Victor and I surveyed in 2006.

Political rumblings in Andhra Pradesh

It was decided by the ruling Congress party  that Andhra Pradesh could follow the fashion created by Bihar and other states and be cut into smaller pieces. This is referred to as 'bifurcation' in the delightful Victorian English that is still used, especially in legal circles.

BUT there are more than 5 million people living in the part that does not include the state capital of Hyderabad,who do not want dividing from the rest of the state into the new part to be known as Seemandhra. There are also a large number of residents in this coastal Seemandhra who want to be a third area called Ryalseema.
Various ministers of the A P state are on hunger strike and because the local Vizianagaram minister is thought to have changed sides in the argument. Some local people poured onto the streets and threatened his properties in the area.A curfew was declared.

All over the state electricity supplies have been disrupted so health services, buses railways and petrol supplies came to a standstill. The big government hospital in Visag is running on generators that burn kerosene at enormous cost.The general mayhem has been going on for 4 days now!

Victor says that the Rainbow children can't go home for the Dusshera religious holiday, to their colonies, because there is no transport to get home on.  If they stay at DMC and Rainbow there is the problem of water and food, as farmers cant bring food to the markets.  Shanti Nivas and Prem Nivas have water wells that have the newly installed hand pumps to draw water and both are growing some vegetables.

The central government will have to intervene and all will return to normal.