Reaching out to the children

Statistically there are 38,000 children in Sub Saharan Africa living with type 1 diabetes. However, the problem is that only a few of them receive medical attention before its too late, and even fewer are properly diagnosed and provided with lifesaving insulin. Fundraising projects initiated by the World Diabetes Foundation in Tanzania and Cameroon support children with diabetes and provide them with a hope of a normal life.

Each year, more than 3 million people die from diabetes-related causes. The burden is particularly harsh in the developing world, where many children with type 1 diabetes die because they lack access to life-saving insulin and where the majority pay for their healthcare from their own pocket to the detriment of the family budget.
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In Tanzania, only one in five children developing type 1 diabetes is diagnosed, leaving many undiagnosed children to die before they even receive any help. This is a great tragedy, as cost effective simple measures for diagnosis are available.

Once diagnosed, help is needed

Other problems surface after diagnosis. Dr. Kaushik Ramaiya from the Tanzanian Diabetes Association (TDA) explains, “Sadly, life expectancy for an African child, whose diabetes has been discovered, is one year. This is due to a large number of interrelated factors ranging from low health care personnel capacity to diagnose and treat diabetes, to the limited availability of insulin and monitoring equipment, lack of cold storage facilities for insulin and the cost of insulin itself”, he explains.

However, to be able to help the children TDA has initiated a project that currently supports 47 children from poor backgrounds in three sites of Tanzania. The cost for providing care for one type 1 child in Tanzania is estimated to USD 535 per year which includes funds for insulin, strips and other related costs.

Building on existing capacity

To meet the need for treatment by trained health care personnel, the child sponsorship programme works through a network of established diabetes clinics. Back in 2003, the World Diabetes Foundation and Novo Nordisk A/S started supporting a fundraising project that has helped TDA to establish a network of 38 clinics in each of Tanzania’s 20 regions to improve overall diabetes care throughout the country.

Doctors, nurses and laboratory technicians have been trained to strengthen diagnostic and treatment capacity to ensure proper diagnosis and good quality diabetes care for type 1 and type 2 patients.

Dr.Msuya is one of the paediatricians attending the children.

Now, three of these clinics; one in Moshi, in the North of Tanzania by the Victoria Lake, one in Mwanza at the foot of the Kilimanjaro Mountain and one on the island of Zanzibar, have been selected to enrol children to the programme. These children receive diabetes treatment for free until the age of 18.

Dr. Kaushik Ramaiya from TDA expects the programme to run for a three year period in which he would try to establish a solution to make it self sustainable after the support ends. The price of funding 50 children for three years is USD 95,000. However, support for this project has been massive; USD 125,000 has been raised through a great variety of fundraising activities within Novo Nordisk A/S. Therefore, the programme can be extended beyond the planned period and to other sites.

Mrs. Karen Birgitte Trock, employee at Novo Nordisk’s Library in Denmark, has arranged book sales to benefit the programme in Tanzania since 2005; “It is wonderful to know that a few days of dedicated work can help children in need for years”. She and her colleagues compete each year to reach last year’s result, in 2007 they collected USD 3,300, and were able to hand over the money to Dr. Ramiya in August 2007. “Hearing his engaged description of the project has only renewed our energy to continue our fundraising” she says and would like to encourage other people to find the time to invent this kind of fundraising traditions.

The fundraising team handed over the latest donation to Dr. Ramaiya personally. From left: Helle Kasarab, Karen Birgitte Trock, Dr. Kaushik Ramaiya, Elisabeth Løhren og Ib Psilander.

As the founder of the World DIabetes Foundation, Novo Nordisk A/S and its employees share our mission. In the past five years Novo Nordisk employees have contributed more than USD 1 million to the Foundation. These donations have facilitated more than 35 clinics in 16 countries and supported the care and traning of children living in Bangladesh, Tanzania, Cambodia and Cameroon.

A week dedicated to diabetes

In West Africa, the situation for children with diabetes is the same, even if they are diagnosed; living with diabetes is a daily struggle. Another project partner of the World Diabetes Foundation, Dr. Eugene Sobngwi from Cameroon, wanted to help children with diabetes to learn how to live with their disease. Dr. Eugene Sobngwi decided to develop a new programme on an existing capacity established with funds from a previous fundraising project.

By collaborating with health care personnel from the obesity clinic in Yaoundé and the Cameroon Diabetes Association (CDA) he arranged a camp for children with diabetes.

A single donation of EURO 5,000 from Novo Nordisk France made it possible for 21 children and youngsters between the ages of 6-20 years to join the one week camp held in April 2007 in Yaoundé.

A team of supervisors, a physician, a nurse, a dietician and lay educators guaranteed that the days consisted of a blend of sports activities, diabetes discussions and social events, giving the children the opportunity to have a good time among other children living with type 1diabetes and learn from each other. At the last day of the week, parents were invited. By joining a discussion, they were given the chance to see that by sharing diabetes thoughts and experiences they can play a key role to motivate the children to an easier acceptance of their condition.

The discussion resulted in a spontaneous decision from the parents to form a club of their own, so that they too can keep in touch and share experiences having children with diabetes.

Two television channels and one national radio station along with newspapers covered the children’s diabetes camp. Attention drawn to the diabetes problem is hoped to benefit the children living where lack of information and timely diagnosis is life threatening.

Dr. Sobngwi and the CDA are already planning a second camp, to be held in February 2008, also funded by donations from fundraising activities arranged by Novo Nordisk employees.

The World Diabetes Day 2007 and 2008 campaigns set out to challenge the situation of children with type 1 diabetes and firmly establish the message that ‘no child should die of diabetes'.

You can view the official WDD film produced in collaboration with IDF and WDF.

Read more about the project in Tanzania

How to donate

This page was last updated 2-6-2008 by jrb.wdf