Written by Dr. Gregory Bartha
Late one afternoon two women brought a two month old infant into the Cross Clinic. The two women – the child’s mother and her sister – were very poor. They had no shoes, and the mother’s left leg had been amputated. She had no crutch or cane. The child was breathing rapidly and loudly. My driver and I rushed her to Mbale Regional. The hospital consists of nine or ten buildings connected by long corridors. We drove up as close as we could to the sick child clinic. The mother carried the baby all the way down a long corridor to the clinic hopping on her one leg. The child was immediately admitted and treated but died after a few hours. The outlook was bad from the beginning, but we had to try. I will never forget that poor woman hopping and carrying her dying child.