FEB-C-10

A PROPOSAL TO THE SAIH OF MHS AND TO THE SPINE SURGERY CENTER OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA

TO ADOPT A SPECIAL PATIENT, MEKONNEN GIRMA,

FROM ADDIS ABABA, FOR CORRECTIVE SPINAL SURGERY

February 26, 2004

I had previously written a note to thank you for your support and help. Especially to Amy who made a big difference, with the sutures and surgical instruments, I could not ask for better assistance!

Please keep collecting, since it looks like I might be back there very soon! (see Feb-C-9)

Meanwhile, I want to ask if any of you could find it possible to make a direct and immediate contribution to someone's health and well being on this side of the world!

Let me fire up your imagination! I have met a young Ethiopia boy who lives in poverty in Addis Ababa, the capital, in an area named only for its radio tower--so it is called Tele-Bole. He has a severe spinal malformation, called kyphosis, the kind of thing that might be easy to fix here, but probably impossible there. He is a well-behaved and gratifying adolescent boy whose name is Mekonnen Girma. I had gone with him to get an X-Ray of his spine, and determined that he has a relatively simple, if severe, deviation that is not scoliosis, but could be repaired, principally if he had someone to sponsor him during his stay here in America. Dr. Rick Hodes, his neighbor, and internist trained at Johns Hopkins Hospital, could work out the details on the Ethiopian end, if he had someone to host him for the period around the time of an operation.

Would any of the SAIH be interested in championing his cause?

GWG

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