Hospice Kits
Compassionate Care
The World Health Organization’s most recent report estimates that in 2018, an estimated 1.7 million people worldwide were newly infected with HIV, and 770,000 died from AIDS-related illnesses, most of them in Africa. In the last several decades, the world has put focus and resources against this disease, and it has made a difference. But progress has slowed, and in 2018 only 62% of people living with HIV were accessing treatment. Too many people, especially those on the margins, don’t have access to the antiretroviral drugs that have made it possible to live with HIV.
Since 1987 Global Health Ministries (GHM) has sent almost 80,000 Hospice Kits to help the hands that heal around the world. Palliative care and hospice programs continue to be an important ministry of the church overseas in countries where thousands of people, like the young Maasai woman in the photo above, benefit every year from their special care for people living with HIV/AIDS, cancer, and other devastating illness. The need has not diminished, and your gift of these Kits is a blessing to those who receive them.
How do we teach compassion? This sweet girl has been coming to an annual day of service at her family’s church in Minneapolis since she was three years old. She comes with her mom and her aunt. and her grandma comes from Sioux Falls each year to share this time with them. Three generations. As she’s gotten a little older, this little girl has continued to participate. When she was six, she declined an invitation to a friend’s birthday party so she wouldn’t miss the day of service. It’s that important. It makes her happy, of course, to spend time with her grandma and family. But she’s also doing something productive as she helps groups assembling Hospice and Newborn Kits for GHM. She’s really helping, and she knows it. She’s part of a community that comes together every year to make a difference in the world. And every year she learns a little more about compassion..
