The Africa Mercy, the world's largest charity hospital ship has returned to Lome, Togo.
In 1990, Togo was the first African country visited by volunteers serving with Mercy Ships visited, and this year's assignment will be the fifth such visit to the West African nation. During the next five months the program will consist of follow-up meetings with patients who received free surgery during the previous visit in 2010 and a phase of new surgeries.
After a six-month Togo field service in 2010, the Africa Mercy required shipyard maintenance in South Africa for an extended period when new generators were installed.
Mercy Ships will use its state-of-the-art hospital ship with six operating theatres, laboratory, pharmacy, 78 beds, and an outpatient clinic to provide free health care to the people of Togo and training for local health care workers until end of May. Many patients who had received surgery will be checked again, and patients who were on a waiting list for surgeries will finally receive long-awaited free surgery. A screening day for potential new surgical patients will be held on February 1. In the past, such screenings attracted thousands of people seeking medical help.
The 2012 field service in Togo will include a range of services including cataract and pterygium surgeries, eye training, maxillofacial surgeries, plastic reconstructive surgeries, life-changing general surgeries, obstetric fistula surgeries, dental care and basic oral health education, and ministering of terminally ill individuals and their families.
Mercy Ships will also help in capacity building by organizing leadership conferences and agriculture training programs. In total volunteers hope to provide more than 1,250 free surgeries, 11,000 dental procedures and the training of 900 local leaders of churches, communities and government representatives.
Togo, officially the Togolese Republic, is bordered by Ghana, Benin and Burkina Faso, and has a population of nearly 7 million. The tropical sub-Saharan nation is highly depended on agriculture with a climate that provides good growing seasons. For several hundred years the coastal region was a major trading centre for Europeans searching for slaves. Togo and the surrounding region became known as the Slave Coast.
As with other countries in West Africa, infant mortality in Togo is high, life expectancy is low, there is a high incidence of major infectious diseases, and health care services are unavailable or unaffordable for most.
For more than 30 years Mercy Ships has used hospital ships to deliver free, world-class health care services, capacity building and sustainable development to those without access in the developing world. Since 1978 Mercy Ships has worked in more than 70 countries providing services valued at more than $800 million, and touched the lives of millions of people. Each year about 1200 volunteers from over 40 nations offer their services as volunteers, all paying their own way to do so. Professionals including surgeons, dentists, nurses, health care trainers, teachers, cooks, seamen, engineers, and agriculturalists donate their time and skills to the effort.
For more information, visit www.mercyships.org.au