TAKING STOCK ON WEEK 3 OF THE SIERRA LEONE MUDSLIDE

Looking back to the immediate aftermath of the mudslide we know that the first two days were chaotic, that government services were overwhelmed but wouldn't invite international aid organizations in; that survivors relied on the many small donations from many, many individuals and civil society organizations like ours.

And we also know that the people who died were blamed for living somewhere the government had warned was unsafe and that death is such a commonplace occurrence in Sierra Leone that not even bodies washing up in Freetown streets elicited much more than a ho-hum, happens in rainy season response from certain quarters, until they literally piled up at the bridges.

We know too, the terrible human cost of this national tragedy, perhaps more than 1,000 souls many remaining unrecovered and never to be afforded the dignity of a burial. The 2,700 child survivors. The 1068 newborns and under 5's.

Today, we made a further donation of direct aid to the Colbot incident command centre, Cline Town for Freetown flooding survivors from Hope, CoDWelA, Society 4 Climate Change Communication and Hart voor Afrika but we were asked, at first, asked to leave our items at the gate (which is not a good sign in Sierra Leone ) and had to settle for the car park...

At least fears of a cholera outbreak are being taken seriously and the Ministry of Health and Sanitation are carrying out training for early identification and action. And some of the lessons from Ebola are remembered with establishment of incident command centres and commitments to mental health support made by the High Commission in the UK.

Come on Board - Join Our Campaign

Join our campaign for child rights and ❤ + share our cause 2 raise awareness 4 mudslide child survivors and all vulnerable children in Sierra Leone.