LIMM Volunteer Betty Room spent May 13-24, 2010 in Siem Reap, Cambodia with the Community Health Education Training Team of Srey Nut, La Sothy and Pastor Vuthy. The CHE team have integrated health education as a regular part of the curriculum for all age levels at the local schools. They also teach a variety of health lessons to the parents of the students once each month. They observing interested parents who might be future candidates for becoming CHE ladies (aka health educators) in their own villages.
The Training Team selected the village of Kahkrabou for further the extension of the CHE training. A local champion, a woman named Hang Chaly, was identified and was provided funds to attend the health lessons in Siem Reap. She has started home visits which has included mostly sanitation, clean water and first aid teaching.
Mapping of the village shows there are 135 families and 851 people living in Kahkrabou. The average adult income in Cambodia is $300 a month. But Kahkrabou is a very poor village and people there make only $300 per year. The mapping of the village was a fun and enlightening project. The map became a vital part of the next session which was the Road to Health. The Road to Health was completed by the Village Committee which comprised of the Village Chief, his two Assistant Chiefs, the Teacher, Hang Chaly and her assistant. Through the Road to Health process three primary concerns were identified. The 1: repairing their road (to enable travel to health clinics, to markets to sell/purchase goods, etc.) and 2: adding latrines and 3: developing a small sewing enterprise to help fund the CHE program. After doing the probability process, the village projects selected for implementation were latrines and the sewing project.
Betty Roon will make one more visit to Cambodia in the fall of 2010.