Children in Crisis: The World’s Greatest ‘Badge of Shame’ | GFA World Special Report Part 2

Last updated on: November 26, 2022 at 7:05 pm By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, which inspired numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to assist the poor and deprived worldwide, issued this 2nd part of a Special Report on the world’s greatest ‘badge of shame’: Children in Crisis.

Street children resting outdoors exposed to danger and hunger — Without much to call their own, these two boys hold tightly to each other. The streets are a dangerous place for anyone to live, but even more so for vulnerable, and often exploited children.

Child Sacrifice: Boy’s Head ‘Sold by Father For $2,000’

Moses' grave site. — 15-year-old Moses went out to buy potatoes and never returned home. His heartsick parents found his body the following week. He is laid to rest here, the cruel victim of child sacrifice and leaves behind not only parents, but his three-year-old sister. This community in Uganda now has a unique alert system that has already rescued two children from a similarly awful fate. ©2014 World Vision/photo by Jon Warren

Other street boys, Kandwanaho told me, fall victim to Uganda’s sinister underworld of child sacrifice. With its roots in witchcraft, child sacrifice is still practiced among both the poor and the rich. Wealthy businessmen abduct a young street boy with few physical blemishes, have him beheaded and then bury the boy’s head under the foundation of a new building “to bring them luck” with their new money-making venture, Kandwanaho said.

A report by ABC Newstells the story of a young mother who found the headless body of her 17-month-old son in a shallow grave in a banana plantation in her rural village near the Congo border. “I pulled my son’s body out of the soil,” she said. “I realized he had no head.” The child’s killer turned out to be his own father, who was given $2,000 by a rich businessman in return for the boy’s head.^[16]

Atrocities against street children are not confined to any single country. In Brazil, news reports tell of organized “death squads” that deliberately seek out and murder street children viewed as nothing more than garbage littering the streets.^[17]

Kandwanaho showed me where his friends sometimes sleep inside giant, used tractor tires, piled up in a yard. One night, they were swept up in a police “clean-up” operation and transported to a children’s detention center outside Kampala. Every year, hundreds of street kids end up in “remand” centers, juvenile prisons, where they can be detained for months or even years without a court hearing. Their crime? Often, it’s just living or begging on the streets and being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Sixty Feet, a nonprofit organization, helps bring smiles back to marginalized and forgotten children. — Sixty Feet serves in the midst of pain and hurt to help bring smiles back to the children most of their society has written off or forgotten. Photo by Sixty Feet

Nonprofit organizations such as Sixty Feet seek to help children in the prison facilities. Their vision is to “provide a Gospel-centered continuum of care for critically vulnerable children that includes minimizing contact with the law, providing for critical needs, and supporting long-term restoration.”^[18]

In Uganda, many street kids are from the northern Karamojong tribe.^[19] They’ve fled the underdeveloped, famine-prone region to come to the capital, where they live in crowded slums, such as the Katwe slum featured in the Disney movie Queen of Katwe, and beg at the intersections. These beautiful children, especially the girls, are extremely vulnerable to sexual predators.

Every month, scores of Karamojong children and families arrive in Kampala, putting more pressure on the slums and increasing the number of kids competing for handouts.

Kids as young as 3 wander along the streets, their hands outstretched, narrowly avoiding the perilous open drainage ditches. If they collect a few thousand Ugandan shillings, maybe 50 cents or a dollar, it goes straight to their parent or someone posing as a parent. Mostly, though, they’re ignored by passers-by and motorists, many of whom believe they’re simply feeding the problem and incentivizing begging if they give a handout.

This exodus of children from poorer, rural areas to the cities in search of food and work is not unique to Uganda. It’s a global phenomenon in poor, underdeveloped countries across Africa, Latin America and Asia.

Street children begging on the streets of South Asia — Small fingers reach through the jeep’s open window. These children shift through the busy traffic in Maharashtra risking life and limb in hopes a few rupees will be slipped their way.

Children at Risk of Starvation

Children in poverty from Haiti walks by mud cakes drying in the sun — Haitian children walk by ‘mud cakes’ drying in the sun. The cakes, made of dirt, salt and oil, make a cheap food to stave off hunger. At 2 cents each, they’re the only affordable food option for thousands of Cite Soleil kids at risk and other impoverished residents. Photo by Crossroads Foundation, Flickr

When crops fail due to drought or other calamity, or work opportunities dry up, children and their parents often face a stark choice: move… or starve.

Driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of young children around the world suffering acute malnutrition, a polite term for starvation, was expected to skyrocket by 20 percent in 2020, according to a report by the U.N.^[20] That’s an additional 10 million starving children worldwide. “Children living on the streets are particularly at risk,” the report says.

In Haiti, the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, I’ve watched children eat “mud cakes,” sun-dried cakes made from dirt mixed with salt, water and a little margarine.^[21] Mud cakes are a symbol of the despair children face in this Caribbean island nation—a sense of hopelessness that continues into adulthood.

“Ask a Haitian, ‘what do you think you’ll be doing in five years?’ and he will laugh,” a Haitian doctor told me. “Our people do not think about tomorrow; we do not plan for the future. We live from day to day. We are a people in survival mode.”

Around the world, humanitarian agencies such as GFA World (Gospel for Asia) have increased efforts to feed the most vulnerable children and their families during the pandemic as millions of day laborers have been laid off from jobs or unable to work because of lockdowns.

The Texas-based agency has distributed food to tens of thousands of families on the edge of starvation in Asia and Africa, filling a critical gap for parents facing the near-impossible task of feeding their children amid total loss of income and with no safety net to fall back on. “The situation in our village is terrible,” one parent told Gospel for Asia (GFA World). “We don’t have any work and we’re unable to provide food.”

Child hunger is also growing in rich nations, such as the U.S., where more than 11 million children live in “food insecure” homes and don’t have enough to eat, according to the U.S. Government.^[22] A staggering 18 million children in the U.S. could go hungry in 2021 because of the pandemic’s economic impact, according to the No Kid Hungry campaign.^[23] In the U.K., 1.8 million school-age children—one in every five kids—is at risk of hunger.^[24]

These children and their family struggle with hunger due to poverty — Uttar Pradesh: Most of the families in this neighborhood live in small houses in the surrounding fields, and typically struggle to make ends meet financially. Parents often earn 50-60 rupees per day as manual laborers, meaning that the family goes hungry, including their children, like these young ones shown here.

Thirsty? How About a Cup of Feces-contaminated Water?

Small boy collecting unclean water from an open water source — Sinduhli, Nepal, March 2021: As the water levels underground start shrinking, people collect water from small puddles in the forest for drinking. This small boy was asked by his parents, who were working in the fields, to fetch water for drinking from a puddle in the hills. But the water collected from these open puddles can be full of germs and bacteria, as other animals and birds use them too, often causing fatal illnesses.

Hunger is dreadful, but for millions of children, the most immediate threat to their health and survival is the lack of safe drinking water. A staggering 2 billion people, mostly in Africa and Asia, get their drinking water from feces-contaminated ponds and watering holes, leading to often-fatal diseases such as cholera and dysentery. Children under the age of 5 are the most at-risk.^[25] The World Health Organization (WHO) says nearly one in every three people in the world doesn’t have access to safe drinking water,^[26] and the U.N. predicts that by the year 2050 up to 5.7 billion people worldwide could be affected by water shortages.^[27] Drinking contaminated water can lead to many deadly diseases, such as typhoid, hepatitis A, and diarrhea. Globally, diarrhea kills almost 2,200 children every day, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).^[28]

Organizations like World Vision and Gospel for Asia (GFA World) have made clean drinking water a top priority.

GFA World drills about 4,000 new community wells called “Jesus Wells” every year, providing safe drinking water for entire villages. Over the past two decades, the organization has drilled more than 30,000 wells and distributed more than 58,000 BioSand water filters that remove 98 percent of water impurities.^[29]

The organization’s Jesus Wells supply safe drinking water to approximately 37.5 million people across Asia—roughly equivalent to the entire population of California.

“We offer clean, life-giving water to all people,” says Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founder, K.P. Yohannan (Metropolitan Yohan). “The Lord has used our efforts to bring clean water to the suffering. They receive healthy, life-sustaining support. This gift of free water is one more way we are able to demonstrate the love of Jesus for those in need.”

Jesus Wells are deep wells, drilled in remote villages in Asia where girls often have to trek miles on foot every day to the nearest watering hole or pond to fetch water, putting themselves at risk of sexual assault and even tiger attacks.

“Our family members were suffering from diarrhea and other [waterborne] diseases,” says Arnab, father of three girls and a boy, describing the difference a Jesus Well has made in his village. “Our children who were sick are healthy now.”

Give to Help Support Children at Risk & Kids in Crisis »

If this special report has touched your heart and you would like to make a real difference in the lives of children in crisis around the world, and bring hope to kids at risk of violence, impoverishment, or child labor, then make a generous one time or monthly gift to help kids in need in Asia or Africa.

About GFA World

Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In GFA World’s latest yearly report, this included thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching providing hope and encouragement available in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit our Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report: Children in Crisis — World’s Greatest ‘Badge of Shame’ — Part 1, Part 3

Learn more about the GFA World Bridge of Hope program and how you can make an incredible difference in the lives of children, bringing hope to their lives and their families, transforming communities.

Learn how to provide a chance for children without sponsors. When you give to help unsponsored children, you help supplement the lack of resources when children in Asia don’t have the sponsors they need to stay in a Bridge of Hope center.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Read what 25 Christian Leaders are affirming about Gospel for Asia.

This Special Report originally appeared on gfa.org.

Children in Crisis: The World’s Greatest ‘Badge of Shame’ | GFA World Special Report Part 1

Last updated on: October 12, 2023 at 10:04 am By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, whose heart to love and help the poor has inspired numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to serve the deprived and downcast worldwide, issued this first part of a Special Report on the world’s greatest ‘badge of shame’: Children in Crisis.

A shocking U.S. Border Patrol video showed human smugglers dropping two unaccompanied children—sisters ages 3 and 5 from Ecuador—over a 14-foot section of the border fence in the New Mexico desert.^[1] The smugglers ran off, leaving the young girls alone and stranded.

Migrant children and their desperate parents enter the U.S. illegally on June 15, 2019 by crossing the Rio Grande in rubber boats near Los Ebanos, Texas. Photo by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Flickr

Another young mother from Central America thought she was on the cusp of giving her 9-year-old daughter a better life in the United States. They’d traveled a long, perilous journey and had just one more hurdle to cross: the Rio Grande River separating Mexico from Texas. Tragically, it was a step too far. The little girl apparently drowned before reaching the other side, NBC News reported.^[2]

Desperate to escape extreme poverty and surging gang violence in their native countries, thousands of migrant children from Latin America continue to flock to the U.S. southern border, with or without their parents. The journey is fraught with dangers that include becoming prey for human traffickers and ruthless drug cartels en route.^[3] Every day in Spring 2021, U.S. border officials were detaining more than 600 unaccompanied migrant children trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border, with many children risking their lives to do so.^[4] According to a CNN report in April 2021, there were more than 20,000 unaccompanied migrant children in the custody of U.S. officials at that time.^[5]

The plight and peril of migrant children seeking refuge in the U.S. is a stark reminder that “children in crisis” are not restricted to far-away countries.

Children are in crisis right on our doorstep, in our own neighborhoods, wherever we live in the world. And the problem is growing worse. Until we take steps to protect and prioritize children, their neglect will be a shameful legacy for the nations of our world.

SANTA TERESA, N.M. – U.S. Border Patrol Agents responded to a potentially life-threatening situation involving two female tender-aged toddlers mistreated and abandoned by human smugglers just west of Mt. Cristo Rey. Camera technology observed a smuggler dropping two young kids from the top of the 14-foot-high border barrier, and then immediately fleeing the area after abandoning the helpless little girls on the north side of the international boundary line around March 30, 2021. Video by U.S. Customs and Border Protection Office of Public Affairs – Visual Communications Division, dvidshub.net

The sight is too much to bear for many Western visitors: A frantic teenage mother, with a newborn strapped to her back, looking for a handout to feed herself and keep her tiny baby alive.

But this real-life scene often isn’t what it appears to be. The baby is not hers. She has actually rented the newborn from its mother or guardian so that her pleas for help solicit greater sympathy from passersby.

Renting out “babies-to-beg” is a common practice in Kampala, Uganda’s capital, where hundreds of children and teenagers from outlying areas—some with parents, many without—descend on the city in the hopes of scraping together money for food. Every day the ritual is the same: hustle, beg, scavenge or steal to survive.

If she’s fortunate, this desperate teenage girl, who is extremely vulnerable to sexual exploitation and prostitution, will solicit enough sympathy to purchase a Rolex. Not the luxury wristwatch Rolex you and I might think of, but an egg-filled chapatti, similar to a burrito, that’s served on nearly every street corner.

Her plight and the fate of the baby she carries on her back are intertwined. Both face a life—likely a very brief life—of perpetual struggle. Both face the threat of abandonment and exploitation. Both girls are continually at risk.

That so many of the world’s children in crisis live without compassionate considerations or safeguards from harm is tantamount to being one the world’s greatest “badges of shame.”

They’re among the estimated 1.2 billion children worldwide who are considered “at risk,” vulnerable to a host of calamities, abuse, hunger and diseases—a toxic combination driven largely by poverty and supercharged by the COVID-19 pandemic.^[6]

2021 Global Childhood Report — The 2021 Save the Children Global Childhood Report highlights the toughest places on Earth to be a child, and examines the many factors that rob children of their childhoods and reveals where greater investments are needed to save children from poverty, discrimination and neglect. Photo by Save the Children

According to Save the Children, more than half the world’s children are at risk of poverty, conflict and discrimination against girls.^[7] A report by the international charity states that one billion children live in poverty, 240 million live in areas impacted by conflict, and 575 million girls live in countries where discrimination against women and girls is common.

According to Save the Children, Singapore and Slovenia are the best places to be a child, where childhood is most protected.^[8] In contrast, Save the Children’s latest Global Childhood Report for 2021, “The Toughest Places To Be A Child,” lists 10 sub-Saharan African nations as the worst places to be a child, “where childhood is most threatened.”^[9]

Perhaps surprisingly to some of our readers, the United States is ranked 43rd on the list, behind Russia, Lebanon and Belarus. According to Save the Children’s report, “The United States badly trails many other advanced countries in helping children reach their full potential.” Nonetheless, it ranks among the top 47 countries in the world where relatively few children miss out on their childhoods. The report states, “Countries with similar scores include Bahrain, China, Montenegro, Qatar, Russia, and Slovakia.”^[10]

Save the Children says millions of children are being “robbed of the childhoods they deserve.” The agency states that every child has a right to childhood free from fear, safe from violence, protected from abuse and exploitation.

The concept of childhood is defined in the (U.N.) Convention on the Rights of the Child. It represents a shared vision of childhood: healthy children in school and at play, growing strong and confident with the love and encouragement of their family and an extended community of caring adults, gradually taking on the responsibilities of adulthood.^[11]

But, the report acknowledges, “This ideal contrasts starkly with the childhood many experience.”^[12]

Poor children in Asia walking along the street — These children, just like almost every child in their Haryana slum, set out early each morning in search of garbage in their area. They go around looking for empty plastic bottles, cans, metal, and the like which they then can sell to make a little money to help their families.

Fatherless Kids in Crisis: The ‘Epidemic’ of the Street Children

Around the world, one of the most critical issues affecting children is the surge in the number of kids living on the streets, with no one to protect them or care for them.

Child abandonment is a worldwide crisis. Globally, the “epidemic” of absent fathers, especially, is a major cause of child neglect, often leaving children without a male role model, protector and provider.^[13]

Combined with the tribal practice of having multiple wives or concubines, it’s not unusual in some African countries for one man to produce upwards of 30 children.^[14] Many of these children grow up never having any relationship with their father, or even knowing who their father is.

An abandoned child in the slums of Kamapala, Uganda — An abandoned child sits alone and neglected next to open sewage in the slums of Kamapala, Uganda in July 2007. Photo by SuSanA Secretariat, Flickr

A report published in 2020 by the African Network for the Prevention and Protection Against Child Abuse and Neglect revealed that child neglect and sexual violence were the biggest issues facing kids growing up in Uganda, one of the lowest-ranking countries.^[15] In 2015, a study of street children in the capital city of Kampala revealed that most kids, the large majority being boys, began their life on the streets between the ages of 5 and 10. Seven out of every 10 street kids had come to Kampala by public taxi or bus. They came for a myriad of reasons. Some came to find work and advance their prospects; others were orphans or victims of abuse or neglect who’d fled horrible home environments; and then there were the rebels and runaways. Almost two-thirds of the kids had lived on the streets for at least a year, and many of them had been on the streets for four years or more. More than half of the children reported they’d been physically abused on the streets, and one in every four said they’d suffered sexual abuse.

Many street boys have nothing more than torn rags or sackcloth to wear as clothes and no shoes on their feet, leaving them vulnerable to puncture wounds that quickly become infected, causing their feet to swell grotesquely. Many of them carry a constant companion tucked inside their ragged clothing—a plastic bottle containing fuel, dipped in a filthy piece of cloth. Every few minutes, they inhale the fumes from the bottle, their eyes floating upwards as the cheap “drug” takes effect. It’s the only way they know to dull their senses and take away the pain and suffering in their lives.

Young boy from Africa collecting garbage to help earn some money for his family — Young Kandwanaho (not pictured) fights for survival by working excruciatingly long hours searching for cardboard to sell. Sometimes he has nothing to show for it at the end of the day and, if so, goes hungry. But even on the days when he makes enough to eat, Kandwanaho still has to join the thousands of other children searching the streets of Kampala for somewhere safe to wait out the night.

I once met a boy named Kandwanaho who told me how he searches the alleys of Kampala from daybreak until dusk, collecting discarded cardboard boxes. He visits the alleyways behind the local market stalls and shops, picking up boxes that once held soap, sodas or other goods. Sometimes, he’ll “strike gold” and find a giant TV box. When he’s gathered several boxes, he takes them to the sprawling downtown marketplace, known as Owino Market, and sells the cardboard to the shoe salesmen. They cut the cardboard into sole-size pieces and slide the card into the footwear to help the shoes keep their shape. If Kandwanaho works a 12-hour shift, he makes just over one dollar.

There are times he roams the streets alone all day—dodging taxis, stubbing his bare toes on the cracked roads, inhaling exhaust fumes, hoarse from thirst—and does not find a single box to recycle. On those days, he has nothing to eat unless he dives into the garbage piles to search for a scrap of anything edible among the competing stray dogs and cockroaches.

For Kandwanaho, and many like him, the most troubling time is nightfall as the city’s hectic rhythm subsides. It’s as if everyone is returning home, except for the kids who live on the streets. They have nobody, and nowhere to call home. The dimming light is their cue to find a place in a drainage ditch or empty shack for the night. It’s their hour to poke around the trash piles for any bits of food ditched at the end of the day. As the light fades, their reality mirrors the approaching darkness.

In Uganda, because street boys are viewed by many business owners as thieves and troublemakers, they’re chased off, beaten up and, in extreme cases, even murdered. The reality that human life is cheap and expendable on Kampala’s volatile streets is clearly evident.

As the lowest of the low, street kids are most often the “whipping boys” when anything goes wrong. Kandwanaho told me that a group of his friends were once caught stealing copper pipes they intended to sell. They were kicked in the head, beaten unconscious, soaked in gasoline and set alight, Kandwanaho recalled tearfully. At their burial in a paupers’ graveyard, he and other street boys were the only mourners present.

Give to Help Support Children at Risk & Kids in Crisis »

About GFA World

GFA World (www.gfa.org) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In GFA World’s latest yearly report, this included thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching providing hope and encouragement available in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit our Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report: Children in Crisis — World’s Greatest ‘Badge of Shame’ — Part 2, Part 3

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Read what 25 Christian Leaders are affirming about Gospel for Asia.

This Special Report originally appeared on gfa.org.

Don’t Drink the Water! (Unless You Know What’s in It) — Part 1

Last updated on: September 10, 2022 at 6:49 pm By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World and affiliates like Gospel for Asia Canada) founded by KP Yohannan, issued the first part of a Special Report update on the ongoing global water crisis, highlighting tap water safety problems in the USA, and clean water challenges in Asia.

In my original special report for Gospel for Asia (GFA) titled The Global Water Crisis, I explored worldwide solutions to humanity’s need for pure, safe water. This update explores tap water safety concerns in the United States and what to do about those, plus clean water solutions in Asia and practical ways you can help.

Photo of Orchids — Like my orchids, people around the globe are affected adversely by the water they consume.

“The orchids are really doing well this year,” commented my husband, David, who usually doesn’t notice these sorts of things. Every year, I yield to temptation and purchase a few orchids in November around Thanksgiving time, hoping they will last through the Christmas season, maybe even longer. Greenhouses, I am told, cultivate orchids all year round.

Generally, I choose orchids with the most buds on them, calculating that there is some energy for growth hiding in these promises of future blooms. My scheme, however, generally degenerates in a wilting kind of reality. The bulbs dry up, turn to tissue-like paper and fall into the potting soil.

This year, however, I affirmed my husband’s comments with some surprise. Even in January, the orchids seemed still to be doing really well. The butterfly-like blooms were all strong, white and crisp. There was no browning around the edges nor had any died. I’d trimmed back some dried-up roots, but that wasn’t too different from previous years. What seemed to be making the difference was that I had changed the water I used to keep the plants fresh.

I had stopped using tap water and used bottles of distilled water instead. This idea was stimulated when I observed an older gentleman loading up the trunk of his car with at least 20 to 30 gallon-size bottles of water.

“You’re going to do more than just drink the water, I hope?” I said as I moved past him toward the grocery store.

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied. “My wife is having trouble growing orchids, so we’re going to try distilled water for a while.”

“I have trouble growing orchids,” I called back. “Maybe I’ll pick up some bottles.”

Like my orchids, people around the globe are affected adversely by the water they consume. On one continent, dirty water pollutes whole communities. On another, tap water contaminates our kitchens.

Which, indeed, I did and have been using that to water my plants every week since, with the results that even my husband noticed and commented on how well the orchids were doing.

Distilled water, for those who don’t know, has been boiled in a vat, leaving impurities behind. This process removes harmful microbes (and also beneficial minerals such as calcium and magnesium). The steam eventually re-condenses, leaving a liquid behind that apparently helps my orchids thrive.

Most people will not deny this truism: Certain kinds of life thrive with certain kinds of water. Of course, this applies to human well-being as well as to plant health.

Like my orchids, people around the globe are affected adversely by the water they consume. On one continent, dirty water pollutes whole communities. On another, tap water contaminates our kitchens.

Group of women drawing clean water from Jesus Well. — Photo left: Clean water from the local Jesus Well is used for drinking, cooking and hand washing, while water from other local wells is used for washing vessels, clothes or bathing. || Photo right: A mother in South Asia carries her son and a pail of fresh, clean drinking water form the local Jesus Well in town.

Despite the Safe Drinking Water Act,
3,000 Areas in the U.S. Have Lead-Contaminated Water

President Clinton signs the amendments to the Safe Drinking Water Act as children and others watch. — On August 6, 1996, President Clinton signed amendments to the Safe Drinking Water Act to implement comprehensive public health protection from the source to the tap.
Photo by US Environmental Protection Agency

To ensure water safety, the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) was originally passed by the U.S. Congress in 1974 to protect public health by establishing regulations about drinking water. According to a paper issued by the Environmental Protection Agency, “The law was amended in 1986 and 1996 and requires many actions to protect drinking water and its sources—rivers, lakes, reservoirs, springs, and ground water wells. … SDWA authorizes the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) to set national health-based standards for drinking water to protect against both naturally occurring and man-made contaminants that may be found in drinking water.”

Unfortunately, today, much of the water supply in the United States, despite the SDWA, is at risk. The Environmental Protection Agency urges that drinking water safety cannot be taken for granted: “There are a number of threats to drinking water: improperly disposed of chemicals, animal wastes, pesticides, human threats, wastes injected underground, and naturally occurring substances can all contaminate drinking water. Likewise, drinking water that is not properly treated or disinfected, or which travels through an improperly maintained distribution system, may also pose a health risk.”

Some 3,000 areas of the United States recently recorded
lead-poisoning rates at least double to those in Flint
during the peak of that city’s contamination crisis.

The most notable example of U.S. water source contamination, which captured the attention of much of the nation, was from Flint, Michigan, where analysis revealed that the town’s drinking water was lead-contaminated and was poisoning much of the citizenry of that community. However, even more shocking was the discovery that Reuters, the international news agency, reported: “Nearly 3,000 areas [of the country had] recently recorded lead-poisoning rates at least double those in Flint during the peak of that city’s contamination crisis. And more than 1,100 of these communities had a rate of elevated blood tests at least four times higher.”

Flint's drinking water pipes showing different kinds of iron corrosion and rust — Insightful pictures examining Flint’s drinking water pipes, showing different kinds of iron corrosion and rust.
Photo by Min Tang and Kelsey Pieper

How Lead Poisoning Affects the Human Body

Hilary Godwin, a chemist at Northwestern University near Chicago, studies the chemistry of lead poisoning on the human body. Photo by National Institute of General Medical Sciences

How does lead poison the human body? The World Health Organization (WHO) released a paper titled “Lead poisoning and health,” which listed the key facts:

Lead is a cumulative toxicant that affects multiple body systems and is particularly harmful to young children.
Lead in the body is distributed to the brain, liver, kidney and bones. It is stored in the teeth and bones, where it accumulates over time. Human exposure is usually assessed through the measurement of lead in blood.
Lead in bone is released into blood during pregnancy and becomes a source of exposure to the developing fetus.
There is no level of exposure to lead that is known to be without harmful effects.
Lead exposure is preventable.

The symptoms of lead poisoning are varied and alarming as WHO warns. These include behavioral changes because brain development is affected: reduced attention span, increased antisocial incidents and failing educational achievement. Anemia, hyperactivity, toxicity to the reproductive organs, blood-pressure-level impacts and renal impairment are some of the signs of lead exposure. Experts believe neurological and behavioral effects are irreversible.

Consequently, not only is the former statement a truism—certain kinds of life thrive with certain kinds of water—but we can logically agree with the experts that polluted water is not the optimum nutrient for mankind. Poisoned water creates life-diminishing conditions for most and particularly for the developing brains and neurological systems of the young.

Reasons for Unsafe Water Supplies in the United States

Workers laying new water pipes — Effective lead‐and‐copper sampling plans allow water utilities to make critical corrosion‐control and water quality improvement decisions to protect public health.
Photo by American Water Works Association

If there is no acceptable level of lead in drinking water, the question must be posed: Why are so many municipalities, homeowners and schools still finding lead in their systems today?

An article by Rachel Layne in MoneyWatch concludes: “One reason may be aging infrastructure and the cost to replace old water pipes and lead solder used in household plumbing. Drinking water is delivered via 1 million miles of pipes across the U.S., much of them laid in the early- to mid-20th century with a lifespan of 75 to 100 years.”

The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that those pipes are being replaced at an average rate of 0.5 percent a year.

“At that pace,” Layne notes, “it would take roughly two centuries to renew the whole system at a cost of around $1 trillion, according to one estimate by the American Water Works Association.”

In fact, as many as 63 million people—nearly one-fifth of the United States—were exposed to potentially unsafe water more than once during the past decade, according to a News21 investigation of 680,000 water-quality and monitoring violations as reported by the EPA.

That finding highlights “how six decades of industrial dumping, farming pollution and water plant and distribution pipe deterioration have taken a toll on local water systems.” According to this report, many local water-treatment plants are not equipped or can’t afford to strain out contaminants. In addition, much of the corroding water-distribution systems are susceptible to lead contamination, leaks in the lines, and consequent bacterial growth due to the instability of this aging infrastructure.

What Can One Concerned Citizen Do?

So, what is to be done? At this point, it behooves a water-drinking citizenry to act responsibly.

My husband and I live in an unincorporated area of a western Chicago suburb, and we have lived here for more than 40 years. Our water is pumped from our own well, which I have assumed to be “safe” water. However, after research conducted for this article, I realized I was relying too much on what might turn out to be unfounded assumptions, so I ordered a complete water-testing kit. When the kit comes, we can test our own water from the tap to determine what minerals exist in this liquid and whether or not there are contaminants. Then we will make plans—perhaps to install filters on certain faucets. If needed, that will require additional Internet research.

A citizen, concerned about his or her municipality’s water supply, can look up reports online as to the status of local sources. The mayor’s office of our little town of 27,000 has published a comprehensive “state of the water” report, which was mailed to all the addresses in our community; that report is also published on the Internet and identifies any possible trouble spots or any deep water reservoirs that may be problematic. If there are problems with our local water supply, then I have at least informed myself as to their existence. Our mayor also invites citizens who have questions, concerns or suggestions to meet with him once a month; questions about the safety of water supplies can be brought up in such a forum.

The point of this is:

Do not remain ignorant about your community’s water supplies, which most of us drink so casually without considering the quality of its content. (Remember my orchids.)

The following instances should give us all a heads-up warning:

In Waukesha, Wisconsin, 18 miles west of Milwaukee, decades of radium contamination from the city’s underground aquifer prompted officials to draft a proposal to draw water from Lake Michigan for its 71,000 residents. The Great Water Alliance, a $200-million project, is expected to be completed by 2023.
Thousands of rural towns have the most problems because communities often lack the expertise and resources to provide safe drinking water.
In several Southwestern states, 2 million people received groundwater tainted with arsenic, radium or fluoride from their local water systems, with many exposed to these chemicals for years before hundreds of small, low-income communities could afford to filter them out. Some still haven’t cleaned up their water.

Ever wondered what’s causing those puzzling health problems—headaches, stomach troubles, your kids’ irascibility and/or inability to pay attention in class? Maybe there’s something in the water. Check it out.

Healthy water—clear, clean and pure—is one of the great gifts of the Creator to the inhabitants of earth. However, as part of our God-given mandate as caretakers of this remarkable planet, we need to be responsible to guard our water sources, its supply and delivery systems, and to not take for granted what pumps from our wells or flows from our kitchen taps. We have all too often—I certainly am a guilty party—been sloppy stewards of our creation.

Despite the safe water, we assume, we are drinking, we need to be responsible and check out municipal reports or order water-testing kits to make sure. The Environmental Protection Agency has a paper online titled “Ground Water Rule: A Quick Reference Guide” (it’s a dense and comprehensive two pages of analytics, but helpful). If you feel better after changing the water you’ve been drinking, then drink more of the new supply. Health gurus insist that hydrating our bodies is a key principle to achieving better health and more productive daily function.

Give Towards Clean Water Projects

Learn how to provide life-saving water through Jesus Wells and BioSand water filters, and help support ongoing maintenance of these clean water projects.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report: Don’t Drink the Water! (Unless You Know What’s in It) — Part 2

This Special Report originally appeared on gfa.org.

Read another Special Report from Gospel for Asia on Solving the World Water Crisis … for Good — Lasting Solutions Can Defeat an Age-old Problem

Learn more by reading this special report from Gospel for Asia: Mosquito-Driven Scourge Touches Even Developed Nations — Malaria Alone Claims 400,000 Lives Per Year

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

New Gospel for Asia Report: ‘Time for Malaria to Buzz Off’

Last updated on: April 26, 2022 at 12:20 pm By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – Global humanitarian agency GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by KP Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like Gospel for Asia Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, suggests in a new report, a long-anticipated vaccine breakthrough could mean the end is in sight for one of the world’s most deadly disease.Mosquito-borne malaria is responsible for more than 400,000 deaths worldwide annually, roughly equivalent to wiping out the population of Miami every year, says the report Malaria, It’s Time to Buzz Off! (https://www.gfa.org/press/malaria/)

Mosquito-borne malaria is responsible for more than 400,000 deaths worldwide annually, says GFA World report Malaria, It's Time to Buzz Off! — **TIME FOR MALARIA TO BUZZ OFF:** Mosquito-borne malaria kills a child somewhere every 2 minutes. GFA World’s (www.gfa.org) new report Malaria, It’s Time to Buzz Off! (https://www.gfa.org/press/malaria/) – released for World Malaria Day, April 25 – spotlights the new vaccine that could help finally eradicate the disease worldwide.

The report – coinciding with World Malaria Day, April 25 – says the disease that’s rampant in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia kills a child somewhere every 2 minutes, making the tiny mosquito more deadly than “sharks, wolves, lions, crocodiles and snakes combined.”

But now that could change with the first-ever approval of a vaccine for widespread use by the World Health Organization (WHO). Calling it “the ‘buzz’ millions around the world have been waiting to hear,” the report describes the new 4-dose vaccine as a “game-changing development.”

By last October, 2.3 million shots-in-arms were administered to children in the 3-nation vaccine trial covering parts of Ghana, Kenya and Malawi in Africa. The vaccine – 30-plus years in the making – reduced cases of severe and deadly malaria by 30%, notes the report.

Malaria and Changing Climate

The encouraging news, at long last, of an effective vaccine comes after a study by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine suggested changing temperatures could eventually cause a dramatic increase in malaria cases.

A staggering 8.4 billion people could be at risk from malaria and dengue fever by the end of the century if rising temperatures “were to go unchecked and the world’s population continues to ramp up,” the report cites scientists as predicting.

Changes to weather patterns “could cause a northward shift of the malaria-epidemic belt into North America, northern and central Europe, and northern Asia if temperatures heat up,” the report goes on, “placing populations in the developed and largely malaria-free nations of the West at risk.”

Malaria Missionaries

Organizations like Gospel for Asia (GFA World) fight malaria in even the most remote locations, such as the mountains of South Asia. Driven by their belief that “every life is precious to God,” the agency’s local missionaries climbed a mountain on foot to deliver lifesaving mosquito bed nets and malaria medicine to isolated villagers.

“From the day they brought the medicine and nets, not a single person in that community died of malaria,” said Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founder K.P. Yohannan (Metropolitan Yohan), whose organization’s local missionaries have given out more than 1.3 million mosquito nets in communities across Asia. “This truly shows people that God cares about them.”

China: A Malaria Success Story

Last year, after a 70-year battle against the disease, China was declared malaria-free – the first country in the Western Pacific region in more than 3 decades to rid itself of the disease. During the Vietnam War, “more Chinese soldiers died from malaria than bullets in the mosquito-ridden jungles,” the report says.

“China has shown us it’s possible to obliterate malaria from the world’s most populated country,” the report continues. “And now, with an effective vaccine, the end is finally in sight around the globe.”

About GFA World

Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In a typical year, this includes thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching to provide hope and encouragement in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit the Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.

Learn more about how generosity can change lives. Through GFA World (Gospel for Asia) and its Christmas Gift Catalog, gifts like pigs, bicycles and sewing machines break the cycle of poverty and show Christ’s love to impoverished families in Asia. One gift can have a far-reaching impact, touching families and rippling out to transform entire communities.

Learn more how to save families from the sickening agony or death from malaria through the gift of Mosquito Nets that offer protection from the sting of an infected mosquito and help to give their owner a restful nights sleep.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Source: GFA World Digital Media News Room, ‘Time for Malaria to Buzz Off’ Says New GFA World Report

Widows Face Uphill Battle After Losing Spouses – Part 2

Last updated on: April 27, 2022 at 5:36 pm By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World and affiliates like Gospel for Asia Canada) founded by KP Yohannan, issued this final part of the GFA Special Report update on the desperate plight of widows in both affluent and developing nations.

Photo collage of desperate widows — Widows like these from across South Asia need assistance to alleviate their difficult circumstances.

Persistent Superstitions

Many might think such marginalization only happened in centuries past, but these recent stories illustrate that ancient cultural customs, superstitions and prejudices persist. According to the Global Fund for Widows, not only do many nations prevent widows from inheriting her rightful assets when her husband dies, some allow women to become part of his estate.

A widow with her son and his family — This widow is living with her son, and his family in West Bengal India. Her husband was killed by a tiger while working. Some widows even witness those attacks and experience post-traumatic stress disorder while grieving.

Such realities emphasize the need for International Widows Day, 15 years after the Loomba Foundation established the first observance to draw attention to widows’ experiences and galvanize more public support.

They are “stigmatized, shunned and shamed” the UN says. “And many of these abuses go unnoticed, even normalized. International Widows Day is an opportunity for action towards achieving full rights and recognition for widows.”

Then there are the problems caused by war and other conflicts. To examine this, the UNHCR—the UN Refugee Agency—dispatched a reporter to Mosul, Iraq, near the end of the government’s three-year-long, on-and-off battle to overcome militant extremists.

The agency examined the impact of fighting, which continued long after the battle ended. Among the victims were Asmaa Mahmood, captured along with her husband and their two young daughters. Two weeks after their capture and separation, Asmaa learned her husband had been killed. As would be expected, she suffered from shock, psychological trauma and grief.

Policy reforms that can help address disadvantages to widows, the World Bank says, are regarding property ownership, inheritance rights, registration of customary marriages and widows’ pensions.

More than 900,000 fled after the final military operation began to retake the city in late 2016. At one camp operated by the UNHCR and its partners, female-headed households made up more than a quarter of the total: 1,250 out of 4,463 families.

Widows like 25-year-old Asmaa faced desperate straits. She hadn’t even told her children of their father’s death after arriving at the refugee camp, evading the truth by telling her girls he had been working and would soon return.

“I am so exhausted worrying about the future of my children,” she said. “Now I have no one to rely on. All I want is to provide a good living for my two daughters. I don’t worry about myself. I just don’t want my daughters to feel any different from other girls who have a father.”

GFA Sisters of compassion serve these desperate widows in slum — These widows living in the slums of Mumbai gather together for support, prayer and practical assistance from the local pastors and Sisters of Compassion serving with Gospel for Asia (GFA World).

Given such earth-shaking situations, the 2019 release of a widow-linked television series may seem like a trifling thing. Yet, despite the six-hour series being primarily an adventure tale, the airing of The Widow on Amazon Prime shows a symbolic consciousness of the situation.

Co-produced by Amazon and Britain’s ITV, the eight episodes drew a critical review in the influential The Atlantic magazine. Yet reviewer Sophie Gilbert noted star Kate Beckinsale gave the main character a “confidence in her action scenes that’s intermittently thrilling.” In real life, widows’ courage is indeed something to behold. While a TV mini-series highlights their plight before viewers, widows require real substantive action by governments, NGOs and individuals like you and me to help them survive financially and emotionally, even as they suffer through their grief.

Quiet Help

While International Widows Day places a spotlight on the problems facing widows, much of the work being done to alleviate their suffering and deprivation occurs in quiet ways.

GFA had 32 teams working across South Asia where 22 percent of widows worldwide live

In 2018, Gospel for Asia (GFA) had 32 teams working across South Asia, where 22 percent of the global population of widows lives, to address widows’ specific needs.

In Asian cultures, many widows are seen as a curse and may be shunned by society, including close relatives.

The following facts show a sampling of what desperate widows face in this part of the world:

Widows are often forcibly evicted from their homes and extended families by the husband’s family after his death.

Widows are often erroneously accused of having caused the deaths of their husbands.

Since widows’ education level is typically much lower, 19 million of them live in extreme poverty, earning less than $2 a day.

Remarriage by widows in this part of the world is low, so street begging or prostitution often becomes a way of life for younger widows.

Many widows are left to care for their children with little help from relatives.

And sometimes children are forcibly removed from their moms.

When not removed, children from low-income families often have to enter the labor force to support their widowed mothers and other siblings.

Consider these practical examples of the impact of widowhood on real people in countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal, India, Sri Lanka and other parts of South Asia—home to 57.8 million widows. There’s Riya, who at 57 became shrouded by the shame of widowhood when her husband died from an unknown illness. Overwhelmed by sorrow and guilt, for three years she struggled to leave her bed.

Then there is Prema, the mother of two young children who suddenly found herself widowed and without a source of income.

And Amey, who struggled to overcome nearly insurmountable odds when riots touched her small village and those responsible tried to extort a fortune from her husband, a dry-fish vendor. When he refused, they killed him in his home. That left Amey with four children to raise by herself, forcing her to sell their belongings in a desperate struggle for survival. When she ran out of money and revived her husband’s business, her success sparked jealousy from other merchants, who harassed her and even tried to kill her.

Amey and family — I had to go through lots of problems after my husband passed away,” Amey (above) recalled. “To protect my children, I had to sell my belongings … Our economic situation went from bad to worse … I was mentally drained …”

In each case, help from Gospel for Asia (GFA) workers brought light and hope and shared how much God loved and cared for them. Thanks to a Gospel for Asia (GFA) initiative teaching women to develop skills and become self-supporting, Prema learned how to sew and received a sewing machine to help her generate income. After a neighbor invited Amey to attend church, she and her daughters found the inspiration and support to start a new spice business.

“I have no words to thank my Lord Jesus for the miracles that He has done in my life,” Amey says. “I am so thankful He has saved me and also protected me in order to be the strength for my daughters. Now we are living with God’s grace, and our lives have been blessed immensely.”

Besides income-generating gifts, Gospel for Asia (GFA) supplies widows with clothing and other essentials, comfort, encouragement and the vital link of prayer support. Gospel for Asia (GFA) also maintains a website, www.mygfa.org, that equips those who want to conduct grassroots fundraising campaigns. Those funds help the poor, including widows, and equip missionaries in the most difficult areas of Asia—where millions have yet to experience His love.

“The Bible says that true religion is to care for orphans and widows in their distress,” Dr. Yohannan says. “The challenge facing the Church around the world today is to not just read the Bible, but follow its teachings.”

These teachings apply the same today as they did thousands of years ago.

If you would like to do something now to help widows around the world, please consider one, or more, of the following ideas:

Raise awareness of the plight of widows by sharing this article with your friends and family via social media, email or a link on your blog.

Interview a GFA World representative on this topic for your podcast or radio show. To facilitate that idea, email [email protected].

Make a donation to help widows in Asia through a gift to GFA World.

Identify a widow that you know personally and invite her to lunch or dinner, with the goal to understand her and her needs better. Act on what you learn to make a difference for that one person.

Give to Help Widows

If this special report has touched your heart and you would like to do something today about the plight of widows around the world, please share this article with your friends and consider making a generous gift to GFA World to help widows in South Asia and other locations.

About Gospel for Asia

Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across Asia, especially to those who have yet to hear about the love of God. In GFA’s latest yearly report, this included more than 70,000 sponsored children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and spiritual teaching available in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. For all the latest news, visit our Press Room at https://press.gfa.org/news.

Learn more about the Sisters of Compassion – those who are specially trained woman missionary with a deep burden for showing Christ’s love by physically serving the needy, underprivileged and poor.

Learn more about GFA programs to address the desperate desperate plight of widows by helping women through Vocational Training, Sewing Machines and Literacy Training.

Learn more by reading these Special Reports from Gospel for Asia:

Ending Violence Against Women — Using Programs and Education to Prevent Discrimination
An Imaginative Exercise in Empathetic Fear — Think About Living in a Community with Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women

This Special Report originally appeared on gfa.org.

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Widows Face Uphill Battle After Losing Spouses – Part 1

Last updated on: April 27, 2022 at 5:25 pm By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World and affiliates like Gospel for Asia Canada) founded by KP Yohannan, issued this Special Report update on the desperate plight of widows in both affluent and developing nations.

After two decades of fighting to eliminate the U.S. military’s “widow’s tax,” Cathy Milford finally succeeded, but she won’t benefit from that change for another three years. That’s how long it will take until she receives full survivor benefits instead of only partial. Though the U.S. Congress passed the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, the bill only phases out the tax by 2023.

“This is just an awful thing to do,” Milford said at a Capitol Hill rally in May 2019, recalling her 25 years of pushing for repeal; her late husband, Harry, suffered a fatal aneurysm soon after retiring from the U.S. Coast Guard. “Every time I talk about this, I have to dig my husband up and bury him all over again.”

The dispute revolved around awards given to survivors of veterans who die of service-related causes (the Dependency and Indemnity Compensation program, or DIC) and a separate, life insurance-type program known as the Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP). While individuals who qualified for either have received full payouts, those getting income from both saw SBP funds reduced by one dollar for every DIC dollar since 1972. The difference of up to $1,000 a month affects 67,000 surviving spouses.

“This problem goes back decades, but this year we finally solved it once and for all,” said Maine senator Susan Collins after the bill’s passage in December 2019.

That securing additional benefits for military survivors took such a protracted fight symbolizes the plight of widows worldwide. Whether husband-less females in Nigeria who have been branded “witches,” women in Asia blamed for their husbands’ deaths and other calamities, or those in South Africa who can lose inheritance rights when in-laws object, the world’s 258 million widows often face an uphill battle.

Widow at cemetery — Women who lose a spouse can face difficult and complicated problems even in affluent societies, as the U.S. military widows’ battle illustrates.

Nearly one in 10 lives in extreme poverty, says the United Nations (UN). While widows have specific needs, their voices are often missing from policies affecting them.

“In some Asian cultures, when a woman’s husband dies, she is often stripped of her dignity, her worth and her human rights,” says K.P. Yohannan, founder of Gospel for Asia (GFA). “Many of these widows are deprived of their home, their property and their possessions—leaving them destitute. Lacking the ability to earn a living, and with no access to savings or credit, millions of widows all across Asia fight every day for their survival, all the while shunned and shamed.”

As the military widows’ battle illustrates, women can face problems even in affluent societies. Another example of the slighting of American widows surfaced in a 2018 report. The Social Security’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reviewed cases of dual eligibility, where a widow can receive her benefit or a deceased spouse’s. The OIG found that 82 percent of the time the Social Security Administration failed to follow its own procedures for spelling out maximum benefit options.

According to statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Loomba Foundation’s most recent World Widows Report:

The United States ranks third in the world for the most widowed women with more than 14 million.

Forty-nine percent earn less than $25,000 a year, meaning “widowhood is often a ticket to poverty.”

In practical numbers:

More than 740,000 widows are unable to provide food, shelter and basic necessities for themselves.

Secondary losses often crush widows, who subsequently may lose homes, jobs, insurance or credit.

In giving 100 stress points for losing a spouse, the Holmes and Rahe Social Readjustment Scale ranks loss of a spouse at No. 1. Other losses can push a widow’s stress level near 300 points, meaning an 80 percent chance of serious illness.

Sisters of Compassion pray for a desperate widow — Three Sisters of Compassion from Gospel for Asia (GFA World) were photographed for this disheartened widow who had recently lost her husband to a tiger attack — a common occurrence in the Sundarbans of West Bengal, India.

Worldwide Problem

Problems for widows exist worldwide. According to the World Bank, it is especially bad in much of Africa, where marriage is the sole basis for women’s access to social and economic rights, which often vanish after widowhood or divorce. Policy reforms that can help address disadvantages to widows, the World Bank says, are regarding property ownership, inheritance rights, registration of customary marriages and widows’ pensions.

“In the face of divorce or widowhood, women often struggle with serious economic hardship,” said Asli Demirguc-Kunt, director of research at the World Bank.

For example, women frequently inherit nothing when a marriage ends. They can be shut out of labor markets, own fewer productive assets and bear more responsibility for caring for children or the elderly.

“Just as widows are often hidden from view in their own communities, the absence of data limits broader public awareness of the issue,” said the story “Invisible and Excluded.” “Quantifying the prevalence of widowhood and divorce requires information on both current widows and divorcees as well as the marital history of currently married women, and this is only available in 20 countries.”

Nearly one in 10 lives in extreme poverty, says the United Nations. While widows have specific needs, their voices are often missing from policies affecting them.

Such disregard can cut deeply, which one 49-year-old Nigerian discovered after her husband committed suicide in 2014. Four months after his death, Christiana came across his bones after searching through forests for three days. Afterward, his relatives summoned her and questioned her intensely, seeking evidence her husband did not die because of her witchcraft.

“They said that I killed my husband,” she told freelance reporter Orji Sunday, “and declared me a witch.” Sunday went on to chronicle how numerous Nigerian widows face similar challenges rooted in cultural practices. Many traditions force women to take an oath to prove her innocence when her husband dies.

“Others confine the widow in place for [a] specific mourning period and others shave her hair, yet others insist that the widow drink the water with which her late husband was washed. Some are given to the brother of the deceased,” Sunday wrote. “Legislation protecting widows is lacking in many states in the country, and in regions where the laws exist implementation is far from convincing.”

Widows with child — The earthquakes in Nepal left this woman as a widow with young kids. Like many others in her nation, she doesn’t know how to start her life again.

Similar stories appear well beyond Africa. In Nepal, a middle-aged woman was blamed for her husband’s death in 2014. Five years later, people in her village accused her of causing the death of a buffalo and beat and tortured her.

“This is a representative example of how a widow is mistreated and traumatized in the country, how widows are looked down upon and treated as inauspicious,” wrote Prakriti Sapkota in a 2019 report. “Widows are among the most vulnerable categories of people in the country. The social stigma attached to them deprive them of their basic human rights and freedom of speech. They are [the] prey of physical and sexual assaults and harassments, accused of various sexual misdeeds and are socially marginalized.”

Give to Help Widows

About Gospel for Asia

Learn more about Gospel for Asia’s programs to address the desperate desperate plight of widows by helping women through Vocational Training, Sewing Machines and Literacy Training.

Learn more by reading these Special Reports from Gospel for Asia:

Ending Violence Against Women — Using Programs and Education to Prevent Discrimination
An Imaginative Exercise in Empathetic Fear — Think About Living in a Community with Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women

This Special Report originally appeared on gfa.org.

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Winning the Ancient Conflict Between Man and Mosquito – GFA World Report Part 2

Last updated on: April 13, 2022 at 10:51 am By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World and affiliates like Gospel for Asia Canada) founded by KP Yohannan, issued this 2nd part of a Special Report update on winning the ancient conflict against the mosquito and vector-borne diseases.

Receiving the gift of Mosquito Nets — National World Mosquito Day commemorates the discovery in 1897 by British doctor Sir Richard Ross that mosquitoes transmit malaria. Gospel for Asia (GFA World) workers hold a variety of events to distribute mosquito nets to guard against insect-borne diseases, including yellow fever, malaria, dengue and zika. These bednet recipients in South Asia smile with appreciation as they can now sleep without discomfort or fear of mosquito bites at night.

Other Means of Mosquito Warfare, Against Vector-borne Diseases

Local and global management of mosquito-borne viruses, many without a vaccine to prevent or a cure to stop the progression of disease, must rely on preventive as well as palliative measures.

A woman puts up a mosquito bednet. — United Republic of Tanzania: A woman puts up a mosquito bednet to safeguard her family at night from mosquito bites. Photo by WHO / S. Hollyman

First, there are protective measures individuals can practice while traveling to or living in mosquito-compromised territories. For instance, local home-dwellers can start by emptying any containers filled with water that are lying around the yard, house or apartment, or in alleys or garbage-collection centers. Tip over that plastic swimming pool and fill it again when needed. Dump any bowls outside that pets feed from. Some out-of-door containers can have holes punched in their bases so that water drains. Clean rain gutters so they don’t become clogged with leaves or debris, which inhibits rainwater from draining and leaves it to pool for days. These practices prevent mosquitoes from breeding in standing water.

Many of these abatement methods are a matter of paying attention and using common sense regarding standing-water sources. For instance, keep grass mowed, trim back bushes and rake up fallen leaves. These are all places where mosquitoes like to hide and breed. Some recommend that any low-lying depressions in a yard should be filled since they will hold water after lawn irrigation or rain. Swimming pools, of course, need to be kept clean and chlorinated. Stocking any small ponds with fish can deter mosquitoes, as fish eat mosquito larvae. As a last resort, for swarms of mosquitoes, spray insecticides.

This, of course, raises its own problems, since most foggers or sprays carry warnings in bold language on their labels. The possibility of unintentional user-poisoning from these highly lethal compounds is evidenced by the cautionary statements on them. For personal protection, a variety of DEET-free (diethyltoluamide) organic repellants are on the market. Many are safe to use around children. In our modern, chemical-wary society, various natural approaches to combating mosquito hoards are recommended, including growing plants that repel mosquitoes. The smell of marigolds, lavender, sage, rosemary and lemon Thai grass make them ideal candidates. A sprig of fresh rosemary placed in water for a few minutes and then placed on a hot grill is recommended as a natural repellant. In addition, pots of basil, bee-balm, catnip or citronella placed in patio or outside seating areas help reduce mosquito colonies.

For travelers, or people living in high at-risk areas like South Asia, a series of personal techniques can be utilized to combat the potential for mosquito bites. These include the following:

Get vaccinated for diseases like yellow fever and Japanese encephalitis. For all other mosquito-borne diseases, which do not have vaccines or medicines, the key strategy is to prevent mosquito bites.

Cover up with long-sleeved clothes and pants when you’re out and about, especially at dusk or night when you have the greatest risk, and avoid bright clothing.

Burn mosquito coils under your dinner table while sitting or eating outside.

Whenever possible, use insect repellant that’s approved as safe and effective.

Use window or door screens to keep mosquitoes out of your house.

Sleep under a mosquito net at night.

Photo by WHO/HTM/GVCR/2017.01 (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO)

Since so many of South Asia’s poorest families cannot afford insect repellant, window screens or long-sleeved clothes, it becomes essential for non-profits like Gospel for Asia (GFA World) to provide the mosquito nets that will at least keep them safe at night.

Bednets distribution — Bednets only have to be changed once every 3-5 years. Here a fresh supply of mosquito nets is distributed to residents in Patang village, Cambodia. Photo by WHO / S. Hollyman

A Childhood Memory of the “Big Ditch”

Long ago, as a schoolgirl, I was assigned to read a book titled Mosquitoes in the Big Ditch. This is the historical account, in children’s literature, of the opening of the Panama Canal, which finally took place after great failure and much loss of life.

Ship passing through the new Agua Clara Locks, Panama Canal. Photo by Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The Panama Canal cuts across the isthmus that joins Panama to Costa Rica at its north and to Colombia at its south. Before its engineering, ships needed to traverse around the southern coastline of South America, a lengthy journey by anyone’s measurement. The French had attempted to cut through this land mass and engineer the massive trench that would allow ships to cut their sailing route from east to west (or vice-versa) by thousands of miles. However, due to epidemics of malaria and primarily yellow fever, the French finally withdrew, and after two decades of hard labor and $287 million of investment, the canal project was terminated in 1889.

At this point, the United States bought the development rights to the Canal from the now-bankrupt French for a fraction of the cost. In the history of entomological transmission, the Americans were to succeed where many had failed because a handful of scientists proved yellow fever was caused through the transmission of the Aedes aegypti mosquito. Before this discovery, the high incidence of infection was attributed to bad water, foul air and disastrous medical-care decisions that allowed the disease to spread.

U.S. Army physician Major Walter Reed finally demonstrated unequivocally that the vector for yellow fever was the Aedes aegypti. A newly-emerged mosquito was allowed to feed on a suffering patient and then bite volunteer coworkers. As predicted, they succumbed to yellow fever several days later. Mercifully, they recovered from the successful experiment.

In 1904, U.S. Chief Sanitary Officer Dr. William Gorgas took on the task of eradicating yellow-fever-carrying mosquitoes from the 500 square miles of jungle canal-zone. Some 4,000 workers, thousands of gallons of sprayed insecticide, 120 tons of pyrethrum insecticide powder, 300 tons of sulphur and 600,000 gallons of oil later, the task was done.

It was to be the first of many thousands of such efforts, large and small, that would be conducted down through the decades since mosquitoes were defeated in the Big Ditch. It is a war, unfortunately, that needs to be won and won and won.

And while mosquitoes were momentarily defeated to construct the Big Ditch, the ancient war between man and mosquito still wages on every day in places like South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. And it takes “getting to know the enemy” to fulfill the task of eradicating vector-borne diseases, and protect people from life-ending mosquito bites.

You can help in this effort today by making a donation to provide mosquito nets to people in South Asia at risk of mosquito bites. Your gift of $50 will provide mosquito nets for five families in Asia, and safeguard them from the life-ending diseases that mosquitoes transmit.

The bump on my hand, in its conglomerate potential, is not so small after all.

Give Mosquito Nets

Learn how to your gift protects families in Asia from vector-borne diseases.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report: Winning the Ancient Conflict Between Man and Mosquito: Know Your Enemy or Succumb to Vector-borne Diseases — Part 1

This Special Report originally appeared on gfa.org.

Learn more by reading this special report from Gospel for Asia: Mosquito-Driven Scourge Touches Even Developed Nations — Malaria Alone Claims 400,000 Lives Per Year

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

GFA World is Aiming to Help ‘Vanishing Generation’ Rediscover God

Last updated on: March 31, 2022 at 7:00 am By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, whose heart to love and help the poor has inspired numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to serve the deprived and downcast worldwide, one of America’s largest Christian organizations is on a quest to help re-energize the faith of those ages 18-30, a group vanishing from the church.

Engaging the Vanishing Generation: GFA World Set Apart 2022 event, June 20-26, aims to help young adults bring faith in God back into focus. — **ENGAGING THE ‘VANISHING GENERATION’:** Gospel for Asia (GFA World) aims to help re-energize the faith of those 18-30, a group vanishing from the church because many of them say God “seems missing.” Organizers anticipate the Set Apart 2022 conference, featuring ministry leaders Metropolitan KP Yohannan, Francis Chan and George Verwer, will attract hundreds of young adults to GFA World’s campus at Wills Point, Texas, June 20-26. Learn more at gfa.org/setapart/.

Nearly two-thirds of 18-29 year olds who grew up in the U.S. going to church have dropped out, according to research. The number of young church dropouts rose to a staggering 64% in 2019.

A 5-year-long study by faith-based research group Barna found almost a third of the young adults described church as “boring,” one-quarter of them said faith is “not relevant,” and 1 in 5 who attended church as a teenager said God “seems missing” from their experience.

Now Gospel for Asia (GFA World), a key player in global evangelical ministry, aims to ignite a new spiritual zeal among Gen Z (late teens and early 20s) and also Millennials, those age 26 and up.

The Texas-based organization is holding its first-ever Set Apart (www.gfa.org/setapart/) retreat June 20-26, with the goal of helping hundreds of young adults discover a deeper calling and trade their smartphones for a time of “listening to God’s voice.” Watch the Set Apart promo video here: https://youtu.be/JPaQSuxNZ7k

“We’ve become addicted to our phones, getting a buzz out of seeing our posts on Facebook and hearing the ‘ding’ when someone responds,” said Bishop Daniel Punnose, vice-president of Gospel for Asia (GFA World) and leader of the young adult conference to be held at GFA World’s campus in Wills Point, 50 miles east of Dallas.

Experiencing Radical Faith

“We want to give young people an experience of the Christianity that has not only sustained the church for 2,000 years, but has turned the world upside down,” Punnose said. ‘To live a life that’s counter to our self-centered culture, this generation needs to see a purpose for their lives that is not centered on themselves, but on Christ.”

Francis Chan –bestselling author of “Crazy Love” – will be one of the speakers at the event, along with George Verwer, founder of Operation Mobilization, and K.P. Yohannan, founder of Gospel for Asia (GFA World).

“There’s such a busyness and craziness to our minds right now,” Chan said. “People need to understand better than ever before how to just be quiet and rest in the Lord, meditate on his word (and) enjoy his presence.”

During Set Apart 2022, young people will learn to listen to God’s voice, meditate on the Bible, and spend time alone in prayer. The experience, Punnose said, promises to bring them closer to God and help them refocus their lives on things that matter. And long beyond the week-long retreat, participants will return home equipped with the tools to stand firm in their faith and live purposely for Christ even in the midst of a world of distraction.

“Most conferences are about going to hear someone talk about God; this retreat is about spending a whole week meeting with God,” Punnose said.

Those 18-30 can go to www.gfa.org/setapart/ for more information and to sign up.

About GFA World

Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In a typical year, this includes thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching to provide hope and encouragement in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit the Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.

Read more blogs on Christian Ministry and GFA World on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Learn more about how to provide pure, clean water to families and villages through GFA World Jesus Wells and BioSand Water Filters.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Source: GFA World Digital Media News Room, GFA World Aims to Help ‘Vanishing Generation’ Rediscover God

A 60-Second Radio Feature from GFA World Inspires Crisis-Weary Generation

Last updated on: March 11, 2022 at 8:48 pm By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, announces: Nearly 40 years after his landmark book Revolution in World Missions shook the evangelical world, K.P. Yohannan — founder of Gospel for Asia (GFA World) — hosts the brand new radio series, GFA Minute (www.GFAMinute.org).

K.P. Yohannan, author of Christian classic Revolution in World Missions, hosts new GFA Minute radio series — **60 SECONDS OF HOPE:** K.P. Yohannan, founder of Gospel for Asia (GFA World)*, has launched a brand new radio series, GFA Minute* (*www.GFAMinute.org), to encourage crisis-weary believers and inspire a generation searching for hope and purpose.*

A new series of rapid-fire radio broadcasts aims to inspire a generation searching for hope and purpose as the pandemic drags on and America faces crises on several fronts.

“People are desperate for encouragement right now and want to know their lives really matter,” Yohannan said. “We’re all looking for hope and purpose.”

He aims to encourage America’s crisis-weary believers and challenge the “digital generation” to “live every minute in the light of eternity.”

“The pandemic, steep price increases in the stores, and deep divisions in our country have left many in America demoralized and disheartened,” said Yohannan, who has seen his Texas-based mission organization grow into one of the largest in the world, serving millions of the poorest families in Asia, and now Africa as well.

GFA Minute challenges listeners to share their faith passionately and practically with a world in chaos. “Today, 2.7 billion people are heading toward eternity without Christ. The One who came to seek and save the lost is now looking for us… to pray, fast, send missionaries, and go serve the poor,” said Yohannan.

60 Seconds of Hope

Yohannan’s 60-second radio broadcasts call listeners to avoid materialism and instead live a Christlike lifestyle of compassion, simplicity, and humility.

“Gospel for Asia (GFA World) has always been about equipping people to impact their world with Christ’s love,” said Yohannan.

OM International founder George Verwer described Yohannan as a leader with “a pure heart (and) great passion.”

GFA World’s national missionaries minister in 12,000 parishes — or local churches — across Asia. The organization is also expanding into Africa.

Visit www.GFAMinute.org to listen to the broadcasts and download free media files.

About GFA World

Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national missionaries bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In GFA World’s latest yearly report, this included thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching providing hope and encouragement in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit our Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news/.

Read more blogs on Radio Ministry and KP Yohannan on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Source: GFA World Digital Media News Room, GFA World’s 60-Second Radio Feature Inspires Crisis-Weary Generation

Toilets Enable a Village to Experience God’s Love

Last updated on: March 1, 2022 at 2:21 am By GFA Staff Writer

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founded by K.P. Yohannan, which inspired numerous charities like Gospel for Asia Canada, to assist the poor and deprived worldwide – Discussing Gospel for Asia (GFA) Pastor Rapoto and his ministry to a village in systemic poverty, and the gift of toilets that helped opened their hearts to God’s love and joy.

GFA World Toilets: Through the gift of 10 new sanitation facilities (one of which is pictured), a village experienced the gift of God’s love. — Through the gift of 10 new sanitation facilities (one of which is pictured), a village experienced the gift of God’s love.

Pastor Rapoto served a small church of 68 believers, conducting Sunday services, prayer meetings, Sunday school and Women’s Fellowship ministries. Twice a month, he would visit a particular village nearby. Though the villagers followed the traditional religious traditions, Pastor Rapoto had faith that God would enable these people to experience God’s love for themselves.

Villagers in Need

Gospel for Asia (GFA) Pastor Rapoto served in this village for eight years before seeing any fruit from his labor. His heart broke for them and their difficult situations: Most of the villagers earned only a meager income from working in the rice paddy fields, generating barely enough money to survive. They would pray to their gods for protection and prosperity, but their situations never improved.

The village did not have proper sanitation facilities, and many residents were falling ill with diseases like typhoid fever, malaria and cerebral malaria. To make matters worse, because of the systemic poverty in the village, the families of those falling sick could not afford treatment.

A Village’s Heart Opened Through GFA World Toilets

Pastor Rapoto knew the struggles of the people living in this village and submitted applications on their behalf for 10 toilets to be installed in the village. Upon hearing the news and receiving the toilets, the villagers were overjoyed!

With these new toilets, they did not have to worry about using the bathroom during the night and in the rainy seasons. Using the bathroom was once dangerous and uncomfortable for the villagers, but thanks to the new toilets, their health conditions began improving, and they experienced just how much God loved and cared for them.

Their hearts opened to what Pastor Rapoto had to say, and they even began asking him to pray for them in their times of need. Through a simple toilet, God enabled these villagers to experience his love and receive his joy.

Read how the gift of a bicycle increased Shakurah’s faith.

*Names of people and places may have been changed for privacy and security reasons. Images are Gospel for Asia World stock photos used for representation purposes and are not the actual person/location, unless otherwise noted.

Source: Gospel for Asia Field Reports & Updates, Toilets Enable a Village to Experience God’s Love

Learn how to help protect people’s health, prevent diseases and help cure illnesses through donating towards Medical Camps, Mosquito Nets and constructing Outdoor Toilets.

Learn more by reading this GFA World Special Report: Taking the Toilet Challenge – Resolving Open Defecation Continues to Confound the World

Read more on Toilets and Open Defecation on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Notable News about Gospel for Asia: FoxNews, ChristianPost, NYPost, MissionsBox

Child Sacrifice: Boy’s Head ‘Sold by Father For $2,000’

Children at Risk of Starvation

Thirsty? How About a Cup of Feces-contaminated Water?

About GFA World

Fatherless Kids in Crisis: The ‘Epidemic’ of the Street Children

About GFA World

Despite the Safe Drinking Water Act, 3,000 Areas in the U.S. Have Lead-Contaminated Water

How Lead Poisoning Affects the Human Body

Reasons for Unsafe Water Supplies in the United States

What Can One Concerned Citizen Do?

The point of this is:

Give Towards Clean Water Projects

Malaria and Changing Climate

Malaria Missionaries

China: A Malaria Success Story

About GFA World

Persistent Superstitions

Quiet Help

The following facts show a sampling of what desperate widows face in this part of the world:

Give to Help Widows

According to statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Loomba Foundation’s most recent World Widows Report:

In practical numbers:

Worldwide Problem

Give to Help Widows

Other Means of Mosquito Warfare, Against Vector-borne Diseases

A Childhood Memory of the “Big Ditch”

Give Mosquito Nets

Experiencing Radical Faith

About GFA World

60 Seconds of Hope

About GFA World

Villagers in Need

A Village’s Heart Opened Through GFA World Toilets

Despite the Safe Drinking Water Act,
3,000 Areas in the U.S. Have Lead-Contaminated Water